[2] Professor Dunne specialises in computational crystal plasticity and microstructure-sensitive nucleation and growth of short fatigue cracks in engineering materials, mainly Nickel, Titanium and Zirconium alloys.
[9] He led the Micro-mechanical modelling techniques for forming texture, non-proportionality and failure in auto materials program at the Department of Engineering Science, University of Oxford between October 2011 and June 2012,[10] when he moved the grant with him to the Department of Materials, Imperial College London from June 2012 until it ended in March 2015.
[11] He also led the Heterogeneous Mechanics in Hexagonal Alloys across Length and Time Scales (HexMat) program, which was Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) funded at a value of £5 million between May 2013 and November 2018.
[12] Dunne was the director of the Rolls-Royce Nuclear University Technology Centre at Imperial College London.
He is part of a £7.2 million program on Mechanistic understanding of Irradiation Damage in fuel Assemblies (MIDAS) that is funded by Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council until April 2024[13] As of November 2022, Dunne is a Professor of Materials Science at Imperial College London and holds the Chair in Micromechanics and the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng)/Rolls-Royce Research Chair.