PhD project themes

Professor Graham Hutchings

• Gold nanoparticles as novel active heterogeneous catalysts
• Design of selective oxidation and hydrogenation catalysts
• Design of novel heterogeneous catalysts

Professor Philip Davies

• Mechanism of photocatalysis and water splitting
• Surface reaction mechanisms studied with scanning tunnelling microscopy and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy
• Nanoparticle stabilisation for heterogeneous catalysis studied with atomic force microscopy and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy

Professor Stuart Taylor

• Development of heterogeneous catalysts for environmental protection
• Heterogeneous catalysts for selective oxidation under mild conditions

Professor Richard Catlow

• Computational Modelling of Structure and Mechanism of Catalytic Systems
• Synchrotron Radiation and Neutron Scattering Studies in Catalysis
• Catalytic Conversion of Carbon Dioxide

Dr Jonathan Bartley

• New methods for synthesizing metal oxides and mixed metal oxides catalysts
• Microwave assisted catalysis

Dr Jennifer Edwards

• Reducing PGM content of heterogeneous catalysts whilst maintaining high activity
• Biomass valorisation through selective hydrogenation
• Rapid Synthesis of highly dispersed nanoparticles via microwave synthetic approaches
• Synthesis of visible light activated antimicrobial/viral nanoparticles
• Visible light assisted water and air remediation of radical formation

Dr Sankar Meenakshisundaram

• Supported monometallic and bimetallic nanoparticles catalysts for selective oxidation, selective hydrogenation, coupling reactions and cascade reactions
• Catalyst development for the valorisation of renewable materials such as CO₂, lignocellulosic biomass components (cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin)
• Towards understanding the structure-activity correlation for catalytic reactions using in situ spectroscopic and kinetic methodologies

Professor Rebecca Melen

• Radical Approaches to Frustrated Lewis Pairs
• New p-block Lewis acids for metal-free catalysis

• Periodic DFT calculations for surface catalysis.
• Monte Carlo and molecular dynamics applied to material properties.
• Chemical kinetics and mechanism in heterogeneous catalysis.

Dr Alberto Roldan Martinez

• Circular economy of plastics: catalysts for plastics functionalisation and reuse
• Innovative heterogeneous catalysts for industially challenging reactions: Biomass valorisation and CO2 utilisation
• Energy storage: electrolysers and low-temperature ammonia synthesis
• The last frontier in Computational Chemistry: Unravelling the catalysts' structure-reactivity-durability relationships

Dr Andrew Logsdail

• Development and application of novel QM, MM and QM/MM methodology
• Investigation of properties of crystalline materials, and how doping affects these properties
• Application of materials towards heterogeneous and homogeneous catalysis, such as MTH and biofuel upgrading
• Simulation of the structure, spectra and reactivity for metal nanoparticles
• Investigation of the interaction and coupling of multi-compenent catalytic systems (i.e. catalyst, support and solvent), and understanding how this affects reactivity

• Atomic-resolution imaging of catalytic nanoparticles under reaction conditions
• Development of 3D imaging techniques for nanomaterials using electron microscopy
• Correlative 3D imaging linking X-ray and electron measurements to understand catalyst structure across length scales

• Enzyme engineering for the green synthesis of molecules
• Biocatalytic approaches to valorise waste materials
• Protein design to explore catalysing new-to-nature chemical reactions

• Semiconductor photocatalysts for environmental remediation, biomass valorisation, and water splitting
• Heterogeneous and hybrid molecular/heterogeneous electrocatalysts and photo-electrocatalysts for the conversion of CO2, ammonia, biomass valorisation, and hydrogen evolution
• Electrochemistry applied to heterogeneous and homogeneous catalysts

• Complexes of earth abundant transition metals for homogeneous catalysis
• s-block complexes for homogeneous catalysis

Professor Kenneth Harris

• Development and application of new strategies for crystal structure determination from powder X-ray diffraction data
• Understanding fundamentals of crystallization processes by in-situ solid-state NMR
• Polymorphism in molecular materials
• Fundamentals and applications of X-ray Birefringence Imaging – a new experimental technique that represents the X-ray analogue of the polarizing optical microscope

Dr Stefano Leoni

• Crystal Structure Prediction
• Materials for Energy Storage

Dr Alison Paul

• Physicochemical characterisation of macromolecules in solution
• Polymer mediated drug-delivery system

• Heavy metal-free organic redox photosensitizer/photocatalyst
• Supramolecular control of light-induced properties of molecular materials
• Organic room-temperature phosphors
• Functional porous materials
• New reaction development and mechanistic investigation

• Design and understanding of new photoswitchable energy materials via dynamic X-ray diffraction
• Advanced microcrystallization for serial crystallography at synchrotrons and X-FELs
• Photocrystallography across the time and length scales: combining single crystal spectroscopy and diffraction studies for in-depth understanding of fast photoswitching phenomena

• Organometallic complexes for energy storage
• Hydrogen storage materials and catalysis

Professor Thomas Wirth

• Development of New Hypervalent Iodine Reagents
• Iodine-based Catalysis for Drug Synthesis.
• Microreactor Technology under segmented-flow conditions
• Flow Electrochemistry for the Green Synthesis of Heterocycles
• 3D - Printing of New Reactors for Flow Chemistry

Professor Simon Pope

• Development of luminescent complexes for bioimaging applications
• Development of hybrid materials for luminescent applications

Dr Angelo Amoroso

• Development of highly fluorescent lanthanide complexes
• Design and synthesis of MRI contrast agents

Dr Niklaas Buurma

• Kinetic and mechanistic studies of Pd-catalysed reactions and their translation to the rational use of enabling technologies
• Kinetics and mechanistic studies of racemisation of drug-like compounds
• Optoelectronically active nucleic acid binders as sensitisers in biosensors
• Directed assembly of functional nanostructures
• Development of analytical techniques for the design of functional nanostructures
• Synthesis of optoelectroncically active nucleic acid binders
• Biophysical studies of nucleic acid binding processes
• Development of software for the analysis of complex equilibrium systems

Professor Ian Fallis

• Immuno-histochemical imaging and applications in clinical pathology
• Synthesis and coordination chemistry of macrocyclic ligands and polydentate Lewis acids

Professor Rebecca Melen

• Radical approaches to Frustrated Lewis Pairs
• New p-block Lewis acids for metal-free catalysis

Dr Paul Newman

• Fused expanded-ring NHCs in coordination chemistry and homogeneous catalysis
• Development of stereogenic-at-metal complexes for asymmetric catalysis
• Novel ligand frameworks for the construction of multimetallic systems

Dr Benjamin Ward

• Asymmetric catalysis using environmentally benign calcium complexes
• Polymerisation catalysis using Earth-abundant catalysts
• Polymers containing CO₂: benign polymers from abundant feedstocks
• Asymmetric catalysis using aluminium complexes

• Synthetic organic chemistry
• Organofluorine chemistry
• Radiochemistry with PET radionuclides
• Radiotracer design and clinical translation

• Drug discovery chemistry
• Synthesis and preclinical evaluation of carbohydrate prodrugs for the treatment of congenital disorders of Glycosylation
• Design and synthesis of small molecules for the treatment of fungal and parasitic infections
• Design and synthesis of small molecules for the treatment of lysosomal storage diseases and neurological diseases
• Synthesis of Drug-conjugates

• Medicinal chemistry/drug discovery
• Small molecule therapies for Lysosomal targets
• Degradation of protein targets (PROTACs, molecular glues etc) and their application to develop therapies for cancer and/or dementia
• Development of small molecule fluorescent probes to understand the key to healthy ageing
• Development of synthetic methodology for serendipitus novel reactions

• Structure and reactivity of highly coordinatively and electronically unsaturated complexes
• Scission and homologation reactions of small molecules, particularly the valorisation of carbon monoxide
• Multidentate ligand design for heterobimetallic complexes
• Low-coordinate complexes for single molecule magnetism

Professor Damien Murphy

• Visualisation of weakly interacting molecules in solution by Selective Electron Nuclear DOuble Resonance (ENDOR) spectroscopy

• Metal-protein interactions in Alzheimer's disease
• Metal-DNA interactions in cancer therapeutics
• Theoretical studies of non-covalent interactions

Dr Emma Richards

• EPR spectroscopy of TiO₂ photocalalysts

• Electron Paramagnetic Resonance (EPR) spectroscopy and associated hyperfine techniques to study paramagnetic species in heterogeneous and homogenous catalysts, including electron transfer mechanisms and spin dynamics
• Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy to study electron transfer and charge dynamics in photocatalysts and electrocatalysts
• Development of hardware and novel experimental protocols for operando-EPR and electrochemical-EPR