DPhil Students

Kira graduated from the University of Edinburgh with an MChem in 2023. For her final year project, she worked at F. Hoffmann-La Roche, in Basel, where she developed a new analytical method for characterising the hydrate landscapes of pharmaceutical compounds. In summer 2021, she completed a Faraday internship following which she published a critical review on ‘Debondable Adhesives and their use in Recycling’. Kira is now a first year DPhil student, and her work focuses on the synthesis of amphiphilic, bio-based and degradable polymers for use in formulations. In her spare time, Kira enjoys hiking and is always on the lookout for a good bakery.

Balázs grew up in Hungary and completed his MSci Chemistry degree with a Year in Industry at Imperial College London. His master’s project, under the supervision of Prof. Mark Crimmin, focused on developing hydrogen-bonding main group complexes for catalytic organofluorine recycling. As part of his degree he has also completed a 12-month industrial placement at Vertex Pharmaceuticals in synthetic medicinal chemistry. Balázs is a first year Inorganic Chemistry DPhil student and his research project focuses on engineering polymers from carbon dioxide using advanced switchable catalysis.

Bonny graduated from the University of St Andrews with an MChem in 2022. Her final year research project focussed on developing manganese catalysed dehydrogenative coupling reactions for the synthesis of polyurea under the supervision of Dr Amit Kumar. As part of her degree, she also did an industrial placement year at Johnson Matthey where she investigated homogeneous catalysts for ester hydrogenation. Bonny is now a student on the OxICFM CDT working on the synthesis of high selectivity and activity catalysts to deliver sustainable elastics.

Baliana obtained her B.Sc. and M.Sc. in Sustainable Chemistry and Technologies at Ca’ Foscari University in Venice and graduated with distinction in March 2022. Her Master’s project focused on the synthesis and characterization of nanomaterials for photocatalytic degradation of organic pollutants in water.  Baliana is a first-year student on the OxICFM CDT and her project, co-supervised by Prof. Ludmilla Steier, focuses on carbon dioxide photo-hydrogenation to value-added chemicals. She will develop stable photocatalysts that can help elucidate the mechanism of photocatalytic CO2 reduction and in the second stage, improve the solar-to-chemical conversion efficiencies.

Kanyapat is from Thailand and graduated with a Master’s degree from Kasetsart University under the supervision of Dr. Pitak Chuawong. He Master's project focused on the investigation of the relationship between substrate properties and regioselectivity to better understand the mechanism of the palladium-catalyzed heteroannulation, the Larock reaction. Kanyapat is now working on single-ion conducting electrolytes by in situ polymerization. 

Mantas joined Williams group in October 2022. Originally from Lithuania, he completed his undergraduate degree in England at the University of Warwick. During his Master’s project, he worked on the formulation of elastomeric 3D printing resins for vitrimer components in soft robotics under the supervision of Dr Chaoying Wan and Prof David Haddleton. He gained valuable industry experience as part of his industrial placement working at TE Connectivity Energy business unit as a materials engineer. Mantas' current research focuses on developing sustainable and degradable polymers with hydrophilic properties via ring-opening (co)polymerisation.

Madeleine graduated with an MChem from the University of Oxford in 2021.  Her final year research project investigated nickel alumina based catalysts for the conversion of CO2 to CH4 under the supervision of Prof. Peter Edwards. She also completed a summer project with Prof. Andrew Goodwin looking at stacking faults in mixed gold and silver potassium dicyanometallates. Madeleine is a student on the OxICFM course and is investigating the chemical recycling of polycarbonates. 

Sandy is from Australia and completed his MRes at Western Sydney University under the supervision of Dr Feng Li, where he worked on structure-function relationships in supramolecular spin-crossover compounds such as cages and helicates. He also worked on projects in electrophoretic diffusion NMR and anti-cancer Pt(II) compounds. Sandy then worked for 6 months in the Advanced Materials Characterisation Facility (AMCF) at Western Sydney University under Dr Richard Wurher. Sandy is working on developing a series of group III and IV catalysts for switchable polymerisations using a range of monomer feedstocks.

Edward graduated from the University of Cambridge with an MSci in Chemistry in 2021. His final year project investigated Pd-catalysed C-H activation of tertiary amines under the supervision of Prof Matt Gaunt. He has also spent two summers working as an intern in Prof Clare Grey’s group in Cambridge studying techniques to measure the state of charge of redox flow batteries using magnetic susceptibility. Edward is now investigating developing catalysts for the synthesis of degradable polymers using renewable resources.

Francesca graduated from Durham University with an MChem in 2020. Her final year project focussed on the synthesis of models for the solid-supported synthesis of glycosphingolipids, supervised by Dr Elizabeth Grayson. She undertook a summer project in 2019 under the supervision of Dr Michael Cowley, synthesising ligands for low-oxidation state aluminium chemistry. Francesca is now a student on the OxICFM CDT working on the synthesis of heterodinuclear complexes for the ring-opening copolymerisation of epoxides and carbon dioxide.

Lukas graduated from the University of Hamburg in Germany. As a part of his Master’s study, he spent six months at Harvard University in the group of Prof. George M. Whitesides researching elastomeric polymers and their applications. His Master’s project was carried out at the Leibniz-Institute of Catalysis in the group of Prof. Johannes G. de Vries and focused on sustainable synthetic pathways to malonic acid from renewables. In addition to his academic education, he gained experience in industry through placements at the Fuchs Petrolub labs and the BASF Polyurethanes GmbH. Lukas joined the Williams group in October 2020 with a keen interest in sustainable polymers from renewable resources and polymerization catalysis.

Holly is from Cornwall, and completed her undergraduate Chemistry degree at the University of Bristol. In 2019, she undertook her MSci final year project under the supervision of Prof. Paul Pringle, studying the synthesis and dynamic bonding behaviour of diphosphanes. Holly is now a student on the OxICFM CDT and is investigating new polymers for use in lithium-ion batteries.