Core Technical Modules
Materials Science 1 Structure and Properties
Maria Romero-Gonzalez
Senior Lecturer in Materials Science. Dr. Maria Romero-Gonzale’s main research areas are biomineralization, surface chemistry, biomaterials, environmental chemistry, engineering and sustainability. She concentrates on the flipped learning, student centred learning, and curriculum design.
Molecules to Materials
David Palomas
Lecturer in Molecules to Materials. Dr. David Palomas graduated in chemistry at the University of Zaragoza (Spain) and obtained his PhD in organic and organometallic chemistry at the University of Oviedo (Spain). He continued his career as a researcher in several institutions and industry in Germany (Max Planck Institute, CAT Catalytic center-Covestro) and the UK (Imperial College-Royal Dutch Shell) working on topics related to organic chemistry and catalysis. David joined the School of Engineering and Materials Science of QMUL in August 2019.
Yamin Abdouni
Lecturer in Molecules to Materials. Dr. Yamin Abdouni received his bachelor's degree in chemistry in 2014 at Ghent University (Belgium) and his master's degree in chemistry at the same university in 2015. He moved to the United Kingdom to undertake a PhD at Queen Mary University of London under the supervision of Dr. Remzi Becer, mainly focusing on the development of novel glycopolymers with controlled sequence and architecture. After receiving his PhD in 2020, Yamin decided to work at QMUL teaching Chemical Engineering modules.
Experiments in Materials 1
Deng Xinru
Convenor for Experiments in Materials Modules. Dr. Deng Xinru holds a Bachelor's Degree from Xiamen University, China, a MEng Degree and a Doctor of Biomedical Materials Degree from Queen Mary University of London, UK. During her PhD, her research mainly focused on biomineralization and developing different approaches to control/guide the nucleation and hierarchical growth of hydroxyapatite crystals at different length-scales.
Materials Science 2 Processing and Applications
Guanjie He
Dr Guanjie He is a Senior Lecturer in Materials Science at Queen Mary University of London. Prior to this position, he worked at the University of Lincoln as a senior lecturer, and served as Advanced Functional Materials Group Lead. Guanjie obtained his Ph.D. in Chemistry in 2018 at University College London (UCL). He has also worked as a visiting researcher at the Energy Sciences Centre, Yale University, and postdoctoral research associate at UCL, Electrochemical Innovation Lab. Guanjie has rapidly expanded his research activities, through a growing number of collaborations in diverse areas from the core focus of aqueous energy storage and conversion materials and devices, to advanced characterisation and simulation.
Chemistry for Materials
Gabriel Cavalli
Reader in Science and Engineering Education. Dr. Gabriel Cavalli has been involved in professional teaching activities since 1993. He is an advocate of student-centred (flipped-classroom) and research-led approaches to teaching and learning. Additionally, he is the Director of the International Centre for Teaching and Learning at QMUL's joint education institute with NPU. In this role he is responsible for championing educational scholarly activity, teaching and learning projects and he also leads in teaching recognition.
David Palomas
Lecturer in Molecules to Materials. Dr. David Palomas graduated in chemistry at the University of Zaragoza (Spain) and obtained his PhD in organic and organometallic chemistry at the University of Oviedo (Spain). He continued his career as a researcher in several institutions and industry in Germany (Max Planck Institute, CAT Catalytic center-Covestro) and the UK (Imperial College-Royal Dutch Shell) working on topics related to organic chemistry and catalysis. David joined the School of Engineering and Materials Science of QMUL in August 2019.
Polymer Chemistry
Gabriel Cavalli
Reader in Science and Engineering Education. Dr. Gabriel Cavalli has been involved in professional teaching activities since 1993. He is an advocate of student-centred (flipped-classroom) and research-led approaches to teaching and learning. Additionally, he is the Director of the International Centre for Teaching and Learning at QMUL's joint education institute with NPU. In this role he is responsible for championing educational scholarly activity, teaching and learning projects and he also leads in teaching recognition.
Yamin Abdouni
Lecturer in Molecules to Materials. Dr. Yamin Abdouni received his bachelor's degree in chemistry in 2014 at Ghent University (Belgium) and his master's degree in chemistry at the same university in 2015. He moved to the United Kingdom to undertake a PhD at Queen Mary University of London under the supervision of Dr. Remzi Becer, mainly focusing on the development of novel glycopolymers with controlled sequence and architecture. After receiving his PhD in 2020, Yamin decided to work at QMUL teaching Chemical Engineering modules.
Physical Properties of Polymers
Dimitrios Papageorgiou
Convenor for Physical Properties of Polymers. Dr. Dimitrios Papageorgiou studied Physics and Materials Science and obtained his PhD in Polymer Nanocomposites from Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. He then moved to The University of Manchester as a Research Associate working under the Graphene Flagship project, investigating the use of graphene and other 2D materials as reinforcements for multifunctional, polymer-based nanocomposites. His work also explores the application of strain on nanomaterials and nanocomposites for the understanding of their deformation mechanisms, their intrinsic mechanical properties and their phase changes under strain. His research interests include high-performance nanocomposites, bio-based polymers and composites, energy generation and storage, sensitive sensors and actuators.
Surfaces and Interfaces
Colin Crick
Senior Lecturer in Materials Science. Dr. Colin Crick’s research interests include: water repellent materials, water purification, and anti-biofouling surfaces. Additionally, he is the Chair of Undergraduate Subject Examination Board at QMES.
Composite Materials
Zhang Han
Dr Han Zhang is a Senior Lecturer in Materials Science at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) and heads the Composites research group at QMUL. He obtained his BEng from Beihang University and Ph.D. from QMUL. His expertise in the field of composites range from design and manufacturing to characterisation of advanced composites and nanocomposites, especially of multifunctional composites for future lightweight structural applications. Han received research funding from various sources including EPSRC, Royal Society, EU, Innovate UK, and UK industries.
Han’s current research focuses on the sustainable development of advanced composites, including energy efficient sustainable manufacturing, integrated health monitoring and easy repairing functionalities for extended components’ life. Han has more than 60 publications in peer-reviewed journals including Advanced Functional Materials, and Composites Science and Technology. Han is the recipient of the 2010 RH Craven Award from Institute of Materials, Mineral and Mining (IOM3) for his excellence in polymer materials.
Experiments in Materials 2
Deng Xinru
Convenor for Experiments in Materials Modules. Dr. Deng Xinru holds a Bachelor's Degree from Xiamen University, China, a MEng Degree and a Doctor of Biomedical Materials Degree from Queen Mary University of London, UK. During her PhD, her research mainly focused on biomineralization and developing different approaches to control/guide the nucleation and hierarchical growth of hydroxyapatite crystals at different length-scales.
Materials Selection in Design
Andrew Spowage
Senior Lecturer in Materials Science. Dr. Andrew Spowage’s engineering work focuses on the performance of materials, specifically selecting materials for a given application and investigating them when they fail in service. His scholarship portfolio covers university transitions, engineering and project management and how to integrated professional practice into engineering programmes. His administrative roles cover quality and teaching excellence for QMUL Engineering Programmes at NPU as well as Industrial Relations in China. Andrew’s teaching and research interests contain two broad areas: 1) The Performance of Materials 2) Education and Engineering Management.
Ceramics
Sun Yiwei
Teaching Fellow in Materials Science. Dr. Sun Yiwei obtained BSc in Physics at Fudan University, China and PhD in Physics at Queen Mary University of London under the supervision of Prof. David Dunstan, on high pressure study on carbon nanotubes. As a postdoc, he joined Electrical Engineering department at Zhejiang University, China on graphene electrical devices and then Chemical Engineering department at University of Brimingham, UK on Graphene-virus biosensors, before working on graphene with Prof. Sir Colin Humphreys in the School of Engineering and Materials Science, Queen Mary University of London. Dr Sun’s research interests are 1) nanomechanics of low dimensional materials, 2) intercalation of atmospheric molecules in layered structures and 3) optimisation of manufacturable graphene devices.
Advanced Polymer Synthesis
Gabriel Cavalli
Reader in Science and Engineering Education. Dr. Gabriel Cavalli has been involved in professional teaching activities since 1993. He is an advocate of student-centred (flipped-classroom) and research-led approaches to teaching and learning. Additionally, he is the Director of the International Centre for Teaching and Learning at QMUL's joint education institute with NPU. In this role he is responsible for championing educational scholarly activity, teaching and learning projects and he also leads in teaching recognition.
Environmental Properties of Materials
Maria Romero-Gonzalez
Senior Lecturer in Materials Science. Dr. Maria Romero-Gonzale’s main research areas are biomineralization, surface chemistry, biomaterials, environmental chemistry, engineering and sustainability. She concentrates on the flipped learning, student centred learning, and curriculum design.
Renewable Energy Materials
Li Zhe
Senior Lecturer in Materials Science at QMUL. Dr. Li Zhe received his PhD from Cavendish Laboratory at University of Cambridge in 2012 and worked as a research associate/research fellow/junior group leader at Imperial College London (2012-2015) and Swansea University (2015-2017), and as a Lecturer of Energy Materials at School of Engineering, Cardiff University (2018-2019).
Polymer Characterization
Personal Profile：
Personal Profile：Chen Yanhui, who received her Master degree and PhD in 2008 and 2013 respectively at Sichuan University, currently is Associate Professor and supervisor for Master students in NPU. Her research mainly focuses on controlling of morphological structure and performance relationship during the processing of semi-crystalline polymer composites. From November 2011 to November 2013, she was a research fellow in the research team led by Prof. Benjamin Hsiao in State University of New York at Stonybrook as part of Joint Cultivation Programme of National High-Level University Construction. She hosted one programme and participated as major researcher in 3 programmes granted by National Natural Science Foundation of China (The National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars, Key International Cooperation Programme). She has published 14 papers including 7 as first author, cited for over 100 times by SCI. She has also got one patent, written one chapter for an English book and published 4 conference papers.
邮箱：yanhuichen@nwpu.edu.cn
Personal link：http://teacher.nwpu.edu.cn/chenyanhui.html
Elastomer Materials
Personal Profile：Prof. Dr. Jie Kong is a full professor in Polymer Chemistry at Northwestern Polytechnical University and Dean of QMUL Engineering School, NPU. Prior to joining NPU, he worked at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University as Postdoctoral Fellow and at University of Bayreuth as Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow. He studied at Northwestern Polytechnical University and received his Ph.D. in Material Science in 2004. His research interests include the design and synthesis of hyperbranched polymers, and their application in ceramic precursors, dielectronic materials and biomaterials. He has co-authored more than 102 peer-reviewed SCI papers in archival journals, such as Macromolecules, Polym. Chem., J. Phys. Chem.B/C, and ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces. He is the principal investigator of four projects granted by National Natural Science Foundation of China, one project granted by the National Defense Technology Foundation for Scientific Research of China (national level), and six projects granted by Aeronautical Science Foundation at provincial or ministerial level. Prof. Kong is the Council Member of Youth Committee of Chinese Materials Research Society, Council Member of and Shaanxi Province Chemical Society, Secretary of Humboldt-Club XI’AN. He is honored as New Century Excellent Talent in Chinese University and Excellent Young Scholar Award of Shaanxi Chemistry. He is co-chair of Precursor-Derived Ceramics Session in the 6th International Congress on Ceramics (ICC6), August 2016, Dresden, Germany, Editorial Board Member for Scientific Reports (handing manuscripts in chemistry field).
Polymer Degradation
Personal Profile：Yan Yi, born in 1983, was a postdoctoral fellow in Chemistry and Chemistry and Biology at Queen's University in Canada and South Carolina University in the US respectively. Currently, he is Professor and supervisor for Master students in School of Natural and Applied Science. He is now hosting programmes granted by National Natural Science Foundation of China, Natural Science Foundation of Shaanxi Province, open programmes of State Key Laboratory of Supramolecular Structure and Materials and so on. His research interests mainly focus on synthesis, manufacture, package and functionalization of functional metal hybrid materials. He has cooperated with a number of research institutes such as Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry Chinese Academy of Sciences, Jilin University, Peking University, Tsinghua University, Tianjin University, Nankai University, and research institutes in America, Canada, and Britain. His research includes hybridization of functional polyoxometalate, synthesis of stimuli responsive materials and package of supramolecular, surfactant of polyoxometalate and colloidal interface, synthesis and package of functional polymers, metal supramolecular, synthesis and function of polymers and so forth.
Thermodynamics and Phase Transformations
Personal Profile：Wang Haifeng is Professor of School of Materials Science and Engineering and was Alexander von Humboldt Fellow of Institut für Materialphysik im Weltraum, Deutsches Zentrum für Luft-und Raumfahrt in Germany. His research interests focus on non-equilibrium theory, non-equilibrium solidification theory of multiphase alloy, transition theory of non-equilibrium solid-state phase, non-equilibrium materials, preparation of bulk amorphous materials, and mechanical property study. He has hosted more than 10 programmes granted by National Natural Science Foundation of China and participated in several “973” programmes and key programmes of National Natural Science Foundation of China. His main projects include Youth Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China (51101122): “study on non-equilibrium solidification theory of multicomponent alloys based on macro-micro methods”; Surface Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China (51371149): “study on thermodynamics and dynamics of binary eutectic three-phase boundary”; programme granted by Henry Fok Young Teacher Fund (151048): “student on composites preparation and mechanical property of damage tolerant Ti-based metallic glass – dendrite”.
Metals 1 Deformation and Strengthening
Metals 2 Alloy Systems and Heat Treatment
Fracture Mechanics
Thermodynamics and Fluid Mechanics
