Paul O'Brien (chemist)

For other people called Paul O'Brien, see Paul O'Brien (disambiguation).
Paul O'Brien
CBE, FRS, FREng

Paul O'Brien in 2013
Born Paul O'Brien
(1954-01-22) 22 January 1954[1]
Alma mater
Employer University of Manchester
Awards Fellow of the Royal Society, Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, Officer of the Order of the British Empire[*], Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering

Scientific career

Thesis Catalysis of the racemization of amino acids (1978)
Doctoral advisor Robert D. Gillard
Doctoral students
  • Ahmed Abdelhady[2]
  • Khadijat Abdulwahab[3]
  • Javeed Akhtar[4]
  • Yousef Alghamdi[5]
  • Enteisar Al-Brasi[6]
  • David Cant[7]
  • Alexander Lockett[8]
  • Akhtar Masood[9]
  • Temidayo Oyetunde[10]
  • Amber Pearce[11]
  • Katayune Presland[12]
  • Karthik Ramasamy[13]
Website

Paul O'Brien (born 22 January 1954)[1] CBE FREng FRS[14][15] is Professor of Inorganic Materials at the University of Manchester.[16][17] where he has served as head of the School of Chemistry from 2004 to 2009 and head of the School of Materials from 2011 to 2015.

Education

O'Brien was educated at Cardinal Langley Grammar School in Middleton, Greater Manchester and the University of Liverpool where he was awarded a Bachelor of Science degree in 1975.[1] He went on to complete a PhD at University College, Cardiff in 1978[1] with a thesis on the catalysis of the racemization of amino acids supervised by Robert D. Gillard.[18]

Research

O’Brien is an inorganic materials scientist focusing on developing new chemical processes for manufacturing thin films and nanoparticles.[16][17][19][20][21] Amongst these are chemical vapour deposition techniques for compounds containing sulfur or selenium, and a very simple method for making quantum dots — semiconductor nanocrystals that show quantum behaviour.[14]

He has collaborated on projects with physicists, computer scientists and electronic and electrical engineers. His interest in the toxicity of metal ions has led to collaborations and publications with toxicologists, pharmacists and clinicians.[14] He is an advocate of communicating science to a wider audience and gives popular talks — usually on nanotechnology — including Café Scientifique and school lectures. He has edited several books, including a series on nanotechnology for the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC).[14] He has supervised numerous successful PhD students.[2][3][4][5][6][7][9][10][12][13]

Awards and honours

O'Brien's awards include the Kroll Award, the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining (IOM3)’s Sir Colin Humphreys Award (for outreach) and Platinum Medal, the Society of Dyers and Colourists (SDC) Gold Medal, the RSC’s first Peter Day Award, and honorary degrees from the University of Zululand, the University of Liverpool and the University of Aveiro. O'Brien was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2013, his certificate of election reads:

“ Paul O'Brien is distinguished for his many original contributions to chemistry and materials science, notably in the use of novel molecularly defined precursors from which to prepare important functional electronic or optical materials in well-defined forms. Processes he pioneered have been widely adopted. His discoveries include substantial improvements in the constitution, stoichiometry and nature of precursors. He has shown how relatively stable compounds can be used to prepare high quality functional materials, and developed improved methods to convert precursors into useful functional products, devising and refining ways by which nanoparticles syntheses can be controlled within the size limits require for device use[15] ”

O'Brien was appointed a Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2016 New Year Honours for services to science and engineering and elected a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering (FREng) in the same year.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 O’BRIEN, Prof. Paul. Who's Who. 2016 (online Oxford University Press ed.). A & C Black, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing plc. (subscription required)
  2. 1 2 Abdelhady, Ahmed Mohammed Said lutfi (2011). Developing novel processes in chemistry for several types of nanoparticles (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  3. 1 2 Abdulwahab, Khadijat Olabisi (2013). Synthesis and characterisation of monodispersed ferrite nanoparticles (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  4. 1 2 Akhtar, Javeed (2010). Structural and optoelectronic studies of lead chalcogenide thin films and nanocrystals (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  5. 1 2 Alghamdi, Yousef Gamaan A. (2013). N-methyl-N’, N’-dimethylethylene-/-propylene-diaminodithiocarbamato-metal complexes as single source precursors for metal sulfide semiconductors materials (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  6. 1 2 Al-Brasi, Enteisar (2013). The growth and characterization of films of noble metal nanocrystals and inorganic semiconductors at the interface of two immiscible liquids (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  7. 1 2 Cant, David (2013). Synthesis and characterisation of semiconductor nanoparticle thin films (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  8. ↑ Lockett, Alexander Michael (2012). A novel approach to the deposition of ZnO nanostructures for use in solar cells (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  9. 1 2 Akhtar, Masood (2013). Synthesis of iron chalcogenide nanocrystals and deposition of thin films from single source precursors (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  10. 1 2 Oyetunde, Temidayo Timothy (2011). Novel precursors for chalcogenide materials (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  11. ↑ Pearce, Amber Marie (2014). Synthesis and characterisation of metal chalcogenide thin films (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  12. 1 2 Presland, Katayune (2010). Synthesis, properties and applications of cadmium based nanoparticles emitting from 400-750 nm (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  13. 1 2 Ramasamy, Karthik (2010). New molecular precursors for metal sulfides (PhD thesis). University of Manchester.
  14. 1 2 3 4 Anon (2015). "Professor Paul O'Brien FRS". London: Royal Society. Archived from the original on 2015-11-17. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where:
    “All text published under the heading 'Biography' on Fellow profile pages is available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.” --Royal Society Terms, conditions and policies at the Wayback Machine (archived September 25, 2015)
  15. 1 2 Anon (2013). "Certificate of election EC/2013/26: Paul O'Brien". London: Royal Society. Archived from the original on 2015-09-29.
  16. 1 2 Paul O'Brien's publications indexed by the Scopus bibliographic database, a service provided by Elsevier. (subscription required)
  17. 1 2 Paul O'Brien's publications indexed by Google Scholar
  18. ↑ O'Brien, Paul (1978). Catalysis of the racemization of amino acids (PhD thesis). University of Wales. OCLC 896125568. (subscription required)
  19. ↑ Trindade, Tito; O'Brien, Paul; Pickett, Nigel L. (2001). "Nanocrystalline Semiconductors: Synthesis, Properties, and Perspectives". Chemistry of Materials. 13 (11): 3843–3858. doi:10.1021/cm000843p. ISSN 0897-4756.
  20. ↑ Govender, Kuveshni; Boyle, David S.; Kenway, Peter B.; O'Brien, Paul (2004). "Understanding the factors that govern the deposition and morphology of thin films of ZnO from aqueous solution". J. Mater. Chem. 14 (16): 2575–2591. doi:10.1039/B404784B. ISSN 0959-9428.
  21. ↑ Trindade, Tito; O'Brien, Paul; Zhang, Xiao-mei (1997). "Synthesis of CdS and CdSe Nanocrystallites Using a Novel Single-Molecule Precursors Approach". Chemistry of Materials. 9 (2): 523–530. doi:10.1021/cm960363r. ISSN 0897-4756.
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