PhD Funding

The Photochemistry for Materials group is looking for an enthusiastic candidate to join our research team at the University of Warwick to carry out a 3.5-year PhD project, under the supervision of Dr Hannes Houck and funded under The Royal Society University Research Fellowship scheme (press release). Our research is situated at the interface of organic synthesis, photochemistry and polymer science with the overarching ambition to meticulously design novel chemical building blocks and finetune their reactivity to design materials with advanced functionality and improved sustainability. Specifically, we develop small molecule photo(cyclo)addition reactions that allow for the efficient formation of covalently bound reaction products under (visible) light irradiation. Importantly, the thus formed adducts display subsequent reactivity that can be activated on-demand to introduce smart and responsive behaviour, including (bio)degradation and closed-loop recyclability. Your PhD project will fit to one, or a combination of, the following research themes: 1. Development of new thermoreversible photocycloaddition reactions We create new photochemistry platforms capable of undergoing quantitative covalent bond (re)formation under visible light irradiation, while being able to selectively and cleanly revert back into the starting reagents at elevated temperature. The resulting chemical bonding/debonding behaviour is meticulously tuned (e.g. red-shifted absorption, lower retro-reaction barrier) to translate the reversible bonding/debonding in industrially relevant applications. Further reading: Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2023, e202310274; Polym. Chem., 2023, 14, 1554. 2. Intrinsically recyclable polymer materials, including covalent adaptable networks We rethink how to make robust covalently crosslinked polymer materials, such as thermosets, that can be repaired (self-healing), reprocessed or entirely depolymerised into the initial monomers to allow for a truly closed-loop recycling. Further reading: J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2024, 146, 19177; J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2019, 141, 12329. 3. Functional new inks for resin-based 3D printing We are motivated to tackle some fundamental challenges in emerging light-based additive manufacturing technologies, such as resin-based 3D printing, to improve the overall sustainability of light-curing inks. Further reading: Adv. Funct. Mater. 2024, 2414713.