Dr Sébastien Rochat (Principal Investigator)
Sébastien was born and raised in Switzerland. He studied chemistry at EPFL, where he had the chance to pursue a variety of undergraduate research projects in the laboratories of Profs Paul J. Dyson (organometallic and medicinal chemistry), Pierre Vogel (asymmetric synthesis) and Geoffrey Bodenhausen (NMR). He also carried out his final MSc project in the laboratory of Nicholas J. Long at Imperial College London in organometallic and supramolecular chemistry- a first taste of UK research! After graduation in 2006 he immediately entered doctoral studies, still at EPFL, that place is hard to leave! He obtained his PhD in Chemistry in 2010 in the laboratory of Prof. Kay Severin, with a thesis entitled “Metal-based chemosensors for important bioanalytes”. Thanks to two consecutive post-doctoral Fellowships awarded by the Swiss National Science Foundation Sébastien then joined the laboratory of Prof. Timothy M. Swager at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he pursued numerous projects related to the development of polymer-based materials for organic electronics and sensing applications. After three years at MIT, Sébastien relocated to the UK, where he took a R&D position at Procter&Gamble. The call of academic research the strongest, he returned to academia at the University of Bath in 2016 to develop nanoporous composites for hydrogen storage (with Profs Andrew D. Burrows, Chris R. Bowen and Timothy J. Mays), and finally at the University of Bristol where he started his independent scientific career in May 2019 as a Research Fellow and Lecturer in Functional Materials. In 2024 Sebastien was promoted to Senior Lecturer to pursue activities in data science and materials discovery.
Current members
Dr Parimal Bhomick
Visiting Research Fellow (2022 – 2023)
Project title: Porous materials for the controlled release of agrochemical molecules.
Anna Yang
Postgraduate researcher, Mechanical Engineering (2019 – )
Project title: Hydrogen isotopes separation using porous materials
Interested in complex gas separations (for example, deuterium from hydrogen) using self-assembled porous cages, her work is also supervised by Prof. Valeska Ting (Faculty of Engineering and Bristol Composites Institute) and Prof. Tom Scott (Physics).
Wendy Tang
Postgraduate researcher, Chemistry (2020 – )
Project title: Liquid Processable Sepiolite-Toughened-Benzoxazine Nanocomposites
Co-supervised by Prof. Ian Hamerton in the Faculty of Engineering and by Dr van Duijneveldt, Wendy’s project aims at reinforcing polybenzoxazines (a series of high-performance polymers with enhanced mechanical performance, flame and fire resistance) by incorporating nano-sized additives. This work is conducted in collaboration with the Bristol Composites Institute and is supported by the China Scholarship Council.
Charlie Brewster
Postgraduate researcher, Composites CDT (2020-)
Project title: Design, fabrication and testing of porous material-metal hydride composites for hydrogen storage
The overarching goal of this project, co-supervised by Prof. Valeska Ting and Dr Lui Terry is to rationally design and fabricate novel nanoporous material-metal hydride composites to exploit desirable properties for hydrogen storage at commercially achievable temperature and pressure conditions. Furthermore, understanding and manufacturing of nanoconfinement composites may lead to developments in catalysts, electronics, and energy storage materials.
Joe Surmon
Postgraduate researcher, Composites CDT (2020-)
Project title: 4D-Biocompatible Morphing Architectures
Co-supervision with Prof. Richard S. Trask, Faculty of Engineering
Stella Wang
Postgraduate researcher, Chemistry (2021 – )
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (MSci project, 2019 – 2020)
Project title: Optoelectronic properties of Polymers of Intrinsic Microporosity (PIMs)
Stella comes from Beijing and likes to spend most of her spare time on Chinese folk dance and piano. She came to the UK at 16 and did her A-levels in Bryanston School, which is located in a small but beautiful town.
She joined the University of Bristol in 2016 to study the 4-year MSci chemistry course. In the summer of 2019, she joined Dr Wuge Briscoe’s lab and undertook a research project on learning how metal cations interact with Lipopolysaccharides (LPS). In her current project, she is synthesising new organic polymers of intrinsic microporosity (PIMs) and determining their optoelectronic properties for applications as luminescent solar concentrator (LSC). Her PhD studies are funded by the China Scholarship Council.
Patrick Grimes
Postgraduate researcher, Chemistry (2022 – )
Project title: Synthetic tissues with collective information processing functions
Co-supervision with Prof. P. Gobbo (Trieste, Italy)
Justin Park
Postgraduate researcher, Chemistry (2022 – )
Project title: Gold nanoparticle-based protocells and tissue-like materials
Co-supervision with Prof. P. Gobbo (Trieste, Italy) and Prof. M. S. Workentin (Western University, Canada).
Baiq Faradina Utari
Postgraduate researcher, Cabot Institute for the Environment (2022 – )
Project title: Water harvesting with microporous polymers
Co-supervision with Dr H. Saidani-Scott (Faculty of Engineering)
James Griffith
Postgraduate researcher (Composites CDT, 2022 – )
Project title: Healing strategies to mitigate micro-cracking in cryogenic hydrogen storage tanks
Co-supervision with Prof. Ian Hamerton, Dr Ram Ramakrishnan (Bristol Composites Institute), Prof. Valeska Ting (Australian National University) and Dr Marcus Walls-Bruck (National Composites Centre).
George Worden
Postgraduate researcher (Composites CDT, 2023 – )
Project title: Modelling and experimental studies of material degradation and performance in a hostile environment.
Co-supervision with Prof. Ian Hamerton (Bristol Composites Institute) and Prof. Katharine Robson-Brown (Jean Golding Institute)
Guofan Xu
Postgraduate researcher (Aerospace engineering, 2023 – )
Project title: Self-healing nanocellulose-reinforced transparent biopolymer to substitute conventional glass fiber composites
Co-supervision with Prof. Steve Eichhorn (Bristol Composites Institute).
Sasha Wilson (Chemistry)
Undergratuate researcher, Chemistry (MSci project, 2023 – 2024)
Project title: Conductivity modulation of thin films of conjugated polymers using photoresponsive spiropyrans
Ben Martin (Chemistry)
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (BSc project, 2023 – 2024)
Project title: A new photocleavable linker for tuneable hydrogels
Alumni
Dr Henry Symons (Post-Doctoral Research Associate, 2022 – 2023 )
Project title: Mechanical properties of soft and stimuli-responsive systems materials
Co-supervision with Prof. P. Gobbo (Trieste, Italy)
Jack Park (Chemistry)
Undergratuate researcher, Chemistry (MSci project, 2022 – 2023)
Project title: Study of microporous polymers for water harvesting
Brent Morris (Chemistry)
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (MSci project, 2022 – 2023)
Project title: Microporous polymers as photocatalysts
Callum Stevens (Chemistry)
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (BSc project, 2022 – 2023)
Project title: Tuning the conductivity of polyaniline with light
Dr Callum Branfoot (Research Associate, 2020 – 2021)
Composite manufacture and experimental mechanics (collaboration with Prof. Ian Hamerton, Bristol Composites Institute, and Rolls Royce)
Stephanie Hall (Chemistry)
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (MSci project, 2021 – 2022)
Project title: Photoconductive Capabilities of Spiropyran and Polyaniline Composite Materials
Josh Pepper (Chemistry)
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (MSci project, 2021 – 2022)
Project title: An investigation into the Electrocatalytic Capabilities of Polymers of Intrinsic Microporosity for CO2 reduction and their Ability to Replace Metal-based catalysts
Honor Westlake (Chemistry)
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (BSc project, 2021 – 2022)
Project title: A study of Polymers of Intrinsic Microporosity (PIMs) in Fluorescence-based sensing Applications
Harry Russel (Bristol Centre for Functional Nanomaterials)
Postgraduate researcher (MSc, 2021)
Project title: Towards Smarter Materials: Bottom-up Approaches to Macroscale Functionalities
Danny Walsh (Bristol Centre for Functional Nanomaterials)
Postgraduate researcher (MSc, 2021)
Project title: Towards Smarter Materials: Bottom-up Approaches to Macroscale Functionalities
Secil Yildiz (Bristol Centre for Functional Nanomaterials)
Postgraduate researcher (MSc, 2021)
Project title: Towards Smarter Materials: Bottom-up Approaches to Macroscale Functionalities
Soorya Kharteesan (Bristol Centre for Functional Nanomaterials)
Postgraduate researcher (MSc, 2021)
Project title: Towards Smarter Materials: Bottom-up Approaches to Macroscale Functionalities
Keyue Wang MSc (Functional Nanomaterials)
Postgraduate MSc student, Bristol Centre for Functional Nanomaterials (2020 – 2021)
Project title: Computational approaches of stimuli-responsive materials: the case of poly(azobenzene)s
Millie Burley MSci (Chemistry)
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (MSci project, 2020-2021)
Project title: Porous Organic Polymers as Photocatalysts for Carbon Dioxide Reduction
Harry Creak MSci (Chemistry)
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (MSci project, 2020-2021)
Project title: Structure-property relationships of conjugated polymers for hydrogen gas production via photocatalytic water-splitting
Ezra Glasstone MSci
Summer project (2021)
Project title: Reprogrammable light-activated circuits
James Davies MSci (Chemistry)
Undergraduate researcher, Chemistry (MSci project, 2019 – 2020)
Project title: Electro- and Photocatalysis with Polymers of Intrinsic Microporosity (PIMs)
Christos Kouzios MSc (Functional Nanomaterials)
Postgraduate researcher, Bristol Centre for Functional Nanomaterials (2020)
MSc project title: Towards Smarter Materials: Bottom-up Approaches to Macroscale Functionalities