Confirmed Speakers

Dr Rachel Evans was appointed as the Ussher Assistant Professor in Device Fabrication in the School of Chemistry, TRinity College Dublin, Ireland in 2011. A native of Wales, she received her PhD in 2007 from the University of Wales Swansea, UK and was subsequently a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellow at the Université Paris-Sud, France. She later held an FCT research fellowship between the University of Coimbra and the University of Aveiro, Portugal, before cutting this short to move to her current position in Dublin.

Dr Evans’ research is concerned with the development of new photoactive materials for application in solar energy conversion, optical sensing and stimuli-responsive membranes. She currently leads a team of 5 PhD students and 2 postdoctoral researchers. She is a recipient of research grants from Science Foundation Ireland, Enterprise Ireland and the Irish Research Council and was named Young Leader of the Year at the 2014 Irish Lab Awards.

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Professor Craig J. Hawker, FRS is Clarke Professor and holds the Alan and Ruth Heeger Chair of Interdisciplinary Science at UCSB. Prior to his arrival at UCSB in 2004, he spent eleven years as a Research Staff Member at the IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose, CA. He received his undergraduate degree in Chemistry from the University of Queensland, his PhD from the University of Cambridge under the guidance of Prof. Sir A. R. Battersby and did post-doctoral work with Professor J.M.J. Frechet at Cornell University. Professor Hawker’s research activities focus on synthetic polymer chemistry and nanotechnology, integrating fundamental studies with the development of nanostructured materials for advanced properties and functions in microelectronics and biotechnology. This work has led to over 450 peer-reviewed papers and 60 patents.

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Dr Julien completed his PhD in 2005 under the supervision of Prof. Bernadette Charleux at the University Pierre and Marie Curie in Paris (France), where he studied nitroxide-mediated polymerization. He then joined the group of Prof. David M. Haddleton at the University of Warwick (UK), as a postdoctoral researcher in the field of polymer-protein bioconjugates. Since 2007, he is a CNRS researcher at Institut Galien Paris-Sud, Univ. Paris-Sud, in Châtenay-Malabry (France), where his current research activities lie in advanced macromolecular synthesis and in the design of innovative polymer-based nanomedicines. In particular, his interests are focused on: (i) the design of multifunctional biodegradable nanoparticles for cell imaging and active molecular/cell targeting; (ii) the development of well-defined molecular/polymer prodrug nanoparticles and (iii) controlled polymerization techniques from both fundamental and applied standpoints; particularly concerning their application for the synthesis of degradable vinyl polymers and innovative materials for bio-related applications.

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Roberto F. A. Teixeira obtained his Ph.D at Warwick University (UK) working on the fabrication of hybrid nanocomposite waterborne materials. In the fall of 2011, he started to work at the University of Ghent (Belgium) as a research fellow focusing on the microencapsulation of novel chemistries developed for self-healing applications. In 2014 he joined Devan Chemicals as a project manager and was responsible for the microencapsulation related projects. In May 2015, he become the R&D Manager of Devan Chemicals and his research interests include the design of assembled supracolloidal structures and the synthesis of their colloidal and macromolecular building blocks, microencapsulation of reactive chemicals, polymeric materials and masterbatches.

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