From Oct 2021, EU PhD students studying in the UK will be charged international fees. This will make teams less diverse and, ultimately, less competitive, because the two are correlated. A sad blow for UK research & I see nothing to counterbalance it. Yet another Brexit bonus.
A brief lexicon for plainer language in research papers:
"utilised" --> "used"
"employed" --> "used"
"deployed" --> "used"
"exploited" --> "used"
"leveraged" --> "used"
I have
#PhD
projects available this year (Oct 2022) in areas including robotics for chemistry, automated organic synthesis, porous materials and renewable materials - most are limited to UK students (thanks to Brexit) -
@AICooperGroup
@MIF_UoL
Just published in
@Nature
, our new paper with
@graeme_day
's group, "Porous isoreticular non-metal organic frameworks" (N-MOFs). Congratulations to
@MeganCarla1
who led this work during her PhD at
@LivUni
🎉 🧵1/10
Though I’m in the picture (taken yesterday, btw 😬🙄), this was a real team effort. Thanks to my multitalented research group for realising this idea: the project (code named Tantalus) was difficult, often maddening, but ultimately great fun.
#RSCPrizes
Just submitted to
@arxiv
:
@amylunt
's work on closed loop autonomous crystallisation, sample preparation, and powder X-ray diffraction. This is the most complex automated workflow that we've built so far, involving 3 separate robots & 13 steps
@LC_Mater_Design
@MIF_UoL
@erc_adam
We are delighted to announce Professor Andrew Cooper as the new Editor-in-Chief of Chemical Science! Read more at and look out for more from Professor Cooper in the new year
How cool is this? My student
@Xiaoyan_W_
went to China over Christmas and one of his Father’s friends painted this - it’s inspired by our 2018
@NatureChemistry
cover (vol 10, issue 12); uses traditional Chinese painting techniques. Going on my office wall... 😍
A first for me today: I had the honour of escorting my PhD student, Ai He, down the aisle. Congratulations Ai and Yan, wishing you both a long and happy marriage.
Calling all coders: would you like to put a bigger brain in this robot? 3-year postdoctoral position available, closes 20-8-2020; Skills & motivation are foremost criteria, rather than specific sub-field; Java skills a big plus
@LC_Mater_Design
@MIF_UoL
Postdoc position available in autonomous discovery of molecular crystals using mobile robots as part of our
@erc_adam
project. Would suit candidates with a background in x-ray diffraction. Closes Dec 13th.
@MIF_UoL
@LivUni
#PXRD
#chemjobs
#robots
To any PhD students who worry about citation metrics: here are citations for the first paper from my PhD (Chem. Phys. Lett., 1993, 212, 611). Still proud of this - we built a unique FTIR pressure cell. Citations peaked at a huge 5 in 2000. Doesn't matter! Just do your best work.
We put positions on hold in 2020 due to COVID; now have 4 Postdoc roles available in
@AICooperGroup
/
@LC_Mater_Design
- Flexibility in 2021 start dates; materials, solar, data sci, comp chem, robots, crystallography. RTs 🙏📢 Ready to rock in 2021 📢
Postdoctoral Research Associates in Mobile Robots for Process Chemistry (2 posts) - - seeking candidates with robotics/software background (Post 1) and synthetic organic chemistry (Post 2).
#robots
#chemjobs
@MIF_UoL
@LC_Mater_Design
Closes 20 Apr RT🙏
Our robot can work happily in total darkness - the lights here are just for the IR cameras. Useful for arch villains with underground lairs. Or for photocatalysis / photosensitive reactions.
Research Fellow in Autonomous Robots for Chemistry (5 yrs, £41,526 - £52,560 pa). Take a leadership role in building autonomous robot chemists. Following
@A_Aspuru_Guzik
's lead: pls DM me your CV if interested
#TwitterDMPostdocSearch
, or apply here: RTs 🙏
Huge congratulations to PhD student
@meiya16370532
(Xue) for her paper published today - "A Cubic 3D Covalent Organic Framework with nbo Topology"
@J_A_C_S
Perhaps the nicest TEMs we've ever got (thanks Mounib!). This work was tough but Xue prevailed 💪👏
A word on "that"
@angew_chem
paper. I reject those views; I'm sure most of the
@angew_chem
staff do, too. Sadly, I'll also bet that the content didn't greatly surprise many chemists. We're complicit, esp. those of us at a more senior level, if we don't challenge these behaviours
June 2023 cover for
@NatureSynthesis
. To the untrained eye, that's 4 x digitally-recolored KUKA KMR iiwa mobile robots, apparently controlled by the eye of Sauron. And by working together, they've synthesized 'red' (IUPAC name: red).
Breaking news! - superstar
@Xiaoyan_W_
has just passed his PhD viva! Photos show a precocious Xiaoyan accepting an award in the first year of his PhD & his
@NatureChemistry
work in 2018. Congratulations!!
@AICooperGroup
Our new paper on 3D COFs using organic cage linkers.
@Eddaoudi_FMD3
's work on high-dimensional MOFs was a key inspiration. But above all: I love that superstar PhD student Qiang, who travelled from China to
@LivUni
for this project, has the Twitter handled
@easttowest10
I do try not to swear on Twitter, but I’m so sick of these mendacious clowns and their fucking bullshit. Science is a global enterprise, the teams developing these vaccines are highly international, and you, sir, are a disgrace to your office.
Glad I spotted this... bringing your wife a coffee in bed is a lot less festive when you’ve decorated it with poultry seasoning instead of pumpkin spice 🤢
Really interesting paper in
@NatureChemistry
by
@banerjee_r
& colleagues - These covalent organic nanotubes are like a 1-dimensionalization of the hexagonal T2E triptycene HOFs we published in . This work could open up a new area!
Some wise words here. I moved to Liverpool primarily because my partner had a job in the region. Various people told me I was mad to leave Cambridge, one said that it was “career suicide”. Best is contextual!
Pssst! Early career researchers!! It’s okay to prioritize location, family, community, mental health, etc. over the “best” positions you are offered. A thread: 1/6
Interesting
@NatureComms
paper here on growth of COF "single-crystals" in supercritical CO2. Raises a question: should we reserve the use of "single crystal" for materials that can be characterised by single xstal XRD? 🧵
Just posted v2 of our preprint on
@amylunt
's work on autonomous robot integration of powder x-ray diffraction, now including pattern matching with CSP data from
@graeme_day
's group
In partnership with the Uni of Southampton and Uni of Rostock, we’ve been awarded a €10 million ERC Synergy Grant to combine computational chemistry and robots to discover new materials
#ERCSyG
#materialscience
The UK has now officially become Bizarro World. Given that
#fish
will soon constitute our entire economy, I’m proud to announce that we’re launching two new journals: Clam Commun. and J. Pollack Chem. A. To be published from a gunboat just off Dogger Bank.
Here's wishing everyone a happy, healthy and successful New Year. I found 2021 tough; I'm hoping that 2022 will be a little easier. Let's remember that colleagues might still be struggling, even if that isn't immediately obvious. Be kind, people.
Calling on the (waning?) power of
#chemtwitter
. I'm Chairing the 2024 GRC in Crystal Engineering; title this year is "Crystals Meet AI". I have a core programme, but open to other speaker ideas, esp. outside N. America / Europe & under-rep. gps. - pls DM me any suggestions RT 🙏
Wrote this perspective on Simard, Su and Wuest's classic 1991
@J_A_C_S
paper. This work has been a big influence on our own, also the growing field of materials now known as HOFs. Truly fitting that this came out on Canada Day! 🇨🇦🥂
@NatureChemistry
Just published: "Room temperature all-solid-state lithium batteries based on a soluble organic cage ionic conductor"
@nemoliverpool
funding from
@EPSRC
and
@LeverhulmeTrust
Embarrassing. On the tube, getting up to offer an older lady my seat, when the train suddenly accelerated & I fell over. “Are you sure, dear?”, she said. Basically, I got punked by Miss Marple.
I'm doing a summer science project with my eldest son. This is the home-built photo reactor that we've made. We're already fighting about prospective first authorship ...
I feel like apologising to all my friends & colleagues from Europe living in the UK. We can blame the politicians and the continual lies, but the sad truth is that a significant % of British voters are small-minded & xenophobic. A very sad day.
From today, the majority of foreign university students cannot bring family members to the UK.
In 2024, we’re already delivering for the British people.
Disenchanted MOF chemist, looking for a change? COF chemist seeking order? Postdoctoral position in non-metal organic frameworks (N-MOFs) available in
@AICooperGroup
/
@MIF_UoL
. Closes Jan 11th 2024. .
Our robot is starting to find things. These data are a sub-set of a 7-component optimization (2 fixed variables; 5 free variables, 3 shown here). In total, >1200 autonomous experiments over a week or so. Overkill, in fact - it found close to the optimum solution in ~250 runs
30 years ago I drew this cartoon of my PhD research group. Copies were given to supervisors & 3 departing postdocs at a group party. I remember that George Davidson’s wife (centre, checked shirt) commented: “George, you really need to get a new shirt.” Happy days.
My wife fell in love with a painting in a hotel in China, but it wasn’t for sale. So Joe and I spent Sunday painting (i.e., forging) it for her birthday. One of these is the original.
Our paper on SO2 capture using porous organic cages is now online . Working with such tricky stuff required a 🇲🇽/🇬🇧 collaboration with the excellent
@MxOFsGroupUNAM
@UNAM_MX
- project led from
@LivUni
side by
@nemoliverpool
. Salud!
We've been thinking through some safety questions related to re-opening labs and thought it might be useful to share some current thoughts, in no particular order - some may be obvious to you, if so apologies:
An early career colleague just shared some proposal review comments. It's quite an achievement to write such didactic, mansplaining, opinionated stuff. No excuse for this at any time & it really grinds my gears in the present circumstances. Polite criticism would suffice, thanks.