Precinct April 05 - University of Liverpool

Precinct Issue 202 08
NEWS
Professor Andy Cooper Professor Matt Rosseinsky
Chemists at the
University of
Liverpool have been
awarded £5.3
million to develop
new complex
materials for use in
areas such as
communications,
medicine, energy
storage, and
nanotechnology.
£5.3m award to develop
new complex materials
T
he grant, awarded by the Engineering
and Physical Sciences Research
Council (EPSRC), will be used to
develop materials with very specific
characteristics by assembling atoms and
molecules into novel forms as the basis for
next-generation technologies.
Project leaders, Professors Matt
Rosseinsky and Andy Cooper, received one
of only six grants awarded by the EPSRC as
part of its Portfolio Partnership scheme,
designed to provide long-term support to top
research teams with a proven track record of
achievement.
The main focus of the grant is the basic
science that will enable these future
technologies; that is, to answer questions
about how atoms, molecules, and small
particles assemble to form more complex
structures. The team also plans to develop
some specific materials for real applications
such as porous solids for gas storage and
polymeric materials for home and personal
care applications.
Professor Andy Cooper explained: “Without
an understanding of the basic ‘molecular
tool-kit’ that we use to build these materials,
it will not be possible to design more complex
structures in the future.
Professor Marianne Elliott, Director of the Institute of
Irish Studies, has recently delivered the Ford Lectures at
Oxford University.
A
series of six weekly lectures,
this is the most prestigious
series of lectures for a historian
of the British Isles to be invited to deliver
and a first for an University of
Liverpool professor.
Professor Elliott said: “It was a great
honour to be invited by the Ford
Lecture’s Electors, particularly since only
two of the 45 previous lecturers have
been women and there has been only
one historian of Ireland 27 years ago.”
Professor Elliott’s topic was Religion
and Identity in Irish History, ranging
from prehistoric Ireland to the present,
with the current Northern Ireland peace
process, a particular interest of the Institute
of Irish Studies, a recurrent theme.
• The lectures will be published by
Oxford University Press next year.
A major aim of organisations like the EPSRC
is to fund basic science that will support
and underpin the more directly applied
research that is going on in UK industry.”
Professor Rosseinsky added: “One of the
goals of this grant is to bring together a
range of techniques that work at different
length scales – for example, to assemble
both small molecules and much larger
particles to make complex structures with
new properties. Understanding and
ultimately predicting these assembly
processes is the key to designing new
materials. Our strategy is based on
synthesis but strongly supported by theory,
computer modelling and new automated
methodologies.”
“We are delighted to
receive this grant, which
reflects the high standing
of work in Materials
Chemistry at Liverpool.”
Professor Rosseinsky
First for University professor