ICAM - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Member of the Programme Management Board
- Intellectual Asset and Commercialisation Specialist, Bp
Job Titles:
- Member of the Governance Board
- Senior Director - Chemistry and Catalysis, Bp
Job Titles:
- Chairman
- Member of the Programme Management Board
- Chairman of Materials Chemistry and Head of the Department of Materials, the University of Manchester
Role: Chair of Materials Chemistry and Head of the Department of Materials
Job Titles:
- Member of the Governance Board
- Vice President
- Senior Technical Advisor for Electrified Vehicles
- Vice President Advanced Mobility & Industrial Products Applied Sciences, Bp
Role: Vice President Advanced Mobility & Industrial Products Applied Sciences
Dr Richard Pearson is bp's Senior Technical Advisor for Electrified Vehicles and Mobility. His work focuses on fore-sighting the impact and opportunities arising from developments in vehicle technology and legislation across the transport sector. He is deeply immersed in projects which facilitate transport decarbonisation through high-power charging of electric cars and trucks, and the use of hydrogen and low-carbon liquid fuels in road, marine and aviation transport. Richard interacts with senior strategy and technical staff across a wide range of vehicle manufacturers in the light- and heavy-duty vehicle space. Based in Applied Sciences, within bp Innovation and Engineering, Richard provides technical support across many bp functions, including bp Pulse, bp's Hydrogen Mobility team, Strategy and Sustainability, bp Ventures, and the technology, marketing, and strategy teams responsible for Castrol lubricants and EV fluids. He has been with the company since 2012.
Before joining bp Richard has previously held positions at Ricardo, in academia (at Manchester University), and at Lotus Engineering, where he spent 14 years, culminating as Head of Vehicle Research. Whilst at Lotus Richard worked on a wide range of technologies including advanced ICE and alternative fuel technologies, hybrid and electric vehicles, and light-weight vehicle structures, carrying out pioneering work in life-cycle analysis of vehicles with alternative propulsion systems. He has represented his respective employers on a variety of government and industrial advisory and strategy boards. Richard has acted as a visiting professor at two UK universities and has published over 120 peer-reviewed technical papers, several book chapters, and two full books.
Job Titles:
- Research Scientist at the Materials Research Laboratory
- Research Scientist, University of Illinois Urbana - Champaign
Dr. Roddel Remy is a Research Scientist at the Materials Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He manages the Center for Excellence in Soft Materials that houses instruments focused on thermal, mechanical and rheological analysis, as well as light scattering and size exclusion chromatography. He joined the MRL in 2018. Roddel obtained a B.S. in Physics from Lincoln University, PA and a Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Delaware.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Programme Management Board
- Senior Manager
- Senior Manager for Applied Physical Sciences
- Senior Manager for Applied Physical Sciences, Bp
Role: Senior Manager for Applied Physical Sciences
Eric Doskocil is the Senior Manager for Applied Physical Sciences, based at S Wacker in Chicago. Eric joined bp in January 2008 in Naperville after spending more then seven years at the University of Missouri-Columbia as an Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering where he led research on acid / base catalysis, renewable chemical production, and supported metal catalysis.
Prior to bp's Reinvent Strategy, Eric was the US Science Team Leader for the Centre of Expertise for Applied Chemistry and Physics (ACP, part of Group Research). Eric's specific expertise is in the field of heterogeneous catalyst materials, including catalyst synthesis, reactivity testing, and advanced characterization related to understanding structure/function relationships for elucidating reaction kinetics and catalyst deactivation.
The Applied Physical Sciences team is the home of green hydrogen and material sciences, including ICAM, and will focus on accelerating innovative solutions for bp across the physical sciences. Eric will work closely with teams across applied sciences and other bp businesses to support the development of low carbon technology offerings to help meet bp's net zero ambitions. Eric has been working with ICAM as a bp Mentor in several projects at UIUC and as a Programme Management Board member; he is also the bp-UIUC research liaison.
Job Titles:
- Spoke Administrator - Illinois
Job Titles:
- Materials Science Manager
Job Titles:
- Spoke Administrator - Imperial College
Job Titles:
- Member of the Governance Board
- Joint Head of the Department of Materials Science & Metallurgy
- Professor
- Professor of Macromolecular Materials Science and Joint Head of Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy, University of Cambridge
Role: Professor of Macromolecular Materials Science and joint Head of Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy
James Elliott is Joint Head of the Department of Materials Science & Metallurgy and Professor of Macromolecular Materials Science at the University of Cambridge. He returned to Cambridge in 1998 from Bristol University where he studied for a PhD in Polymer Physics. He had previously graduated from Cambridge with a MA in Natural Sciences (physics).
James leads an internationally recognized research group on polymeric membranes, carbon nanotube fibres and composite materials. As Principal Investigator on a NERC grant "S2UPPlant: Smart Sustainable Plastic Packaging from Plants" he directs a team working on the production and characterisation of biocompostable films based on cellulosic materials for plastic packaging. He also sits on the Executive Committee of the IoP Polymer Physics Group and is the Director of the EPSRC CDT in Computational Methods for Materials Science.
He was a JSPS Invitation Fellow and Visiting Professor at the University of Tokyo in 2008, and collaborates with several groups working on CNT synthesis and thermal properties of CNT-polymer composites.
Job Titles:
- Spoke Administrator and P.a. to the Director
Job Titles:
- Member of the Governance Board
- Senior Manager
- Senior Manager, Scientific Innovations, Strategic University and External Partnerships Applied Sciences, Bp
Role: Senior Manager, Scientific Innovations, Strategic University and External Partnerships Applied Sciences
Job Titles:
- Member of the Programme Management Board
- Professor
- Professor of Chemistry, University of Cambridge
Jonathan Nitschke received his bachelor's degree from Williams College (USA) in 1995 and his doctorate from the University of California, Berkeley in 2001 under the supervision of T. Don Tilley.
He then undertook postdoctoral studies with Jean-Marie Lehn in Strasbourg under the auspices of a US NSF fellowship, and in 2003 he started his independent research career as a Maître-assistant (fixed-term independent PI) in the Organic Chemistry Department of the University of Geneva. In 2007 he was appointed University Lecturer at Cambridge, where he now holds a Professorship. His research program investigates the self-assembly of complex, functional structures from simple molecular precursors and metal ions.
Job Titles:
- Fellow and Visiting Professor at the University of Tokyo
Job Titles:
- Scientific Grants Manager
Job Titles:
- Member of the Programme Management Board
- Advisor for Disruptive Technologies in Applied Sciences
- Disruptive Technologies Advisor Advanced Mobility & Industrial Products, Applied Science, Bp
Role: Disruptive Technologies Advisor Advanced Mobility & Industrial Products, Applied Science
Kevin joined bp in 2007 after completing his PhD in supramolecular chemistry.
Kevin has spent the majority of his career in R&D roles and has worked across bp in Downstream and Upstream Technology. Previous roles in Downstream include leading the New Additives and Basefluids team and leading innovation in EV battery thermal management fluids and predictive maintenance technology. In Upstream, Kevin led the Chemical Sciences Centre of Expertise and the Upstream Centre for Applied Science.
In his current role, Kevin is exploring ways to use emerging and disruptive technologies to innovate and accelerate technology development in bp.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Governance Board
- Vice President
- Vice President Advanced Bio & Physical Sciences for Low Carbon Energy Applied Sciences, Bp
Role: Vice President Advanced Bio & Physical Sciences for Low Carbon Energy Applied Sciences
Kirsty is Vice President of advanced bio & physical sciences for low carbon energy for bp.
Mandar Thakare is the Associate Director of ICAM. He joined bp in Sep 2019, as the Materials Science Programme Manager, and in Nov 2021 was appointed as the Associate Director. He is responsible for ensuring that the bp-ICAM continues to deliver business value and maintains alignment with bp's strategy for net zero transition. He has over fifteen years' experience in materials engineering, innovation strategy, and new product development. Prior to joining bp, he worked as an Innovation Programme Lead at Element Six Ltd., where he supported a multi-site global team of scientists in developing and commercialising novel polycrystalline diamond products for oil and gas applications.
He holds a BEng in Mechanical Engineering (Mumbai, India), MSc in Surface Engineering (University of Nottingham), a PhD in Tribology (University of Southampton, Schlumberger plc funded) and an MBA (Alliance Manchester Business School). Prior to Element Six Ltd., he held a post-doctoral research position at the Osney Thermofluids Lab, University of Oxford, working closely with Rolls-Royce plc on gas turbine seals. During this period, he also tutored undergraduates in Engineering Science at St. Catherine's College, Oxford. After his PhD, he worked for Schlumberger plc, developing wear-corrosion resistant solutions for downhole directional drilling systems. During this period, he was responsible for identifying and qualifying coatings and materials solutions for Schlumberger tools deployed globally, through new suppliers and technologies. He has published journal papers, book chapters and conference papers on the subject of tribocorrosion and is a member of the IMechE Tribology Committee, as well as a reviewer for journals such as Wear, Tribology International, ASME Journal of Tribology. In 2020, he was also elected Fellow of the Institute of Materials, Minerals, and Mining (IoM3) and is part of the IoM3 Energy Transition Group's leadership team.
Mandar Thakare is the Associate Director of ICAM. He joined bp in Sep 2019, as the Materials Science Programme Manager in Group Research, and is responsible for the operational aspects of the ICAM partnership
Job Titles:
- Member of the Governance Board
- Vice President
- Expert
- Vice President and Dean of the Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences and Professor of Chemistry, the University of Manchester
Role: Vice President and Dean of the Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences and Professor of Chemistry
Martin Schröder is an expert in materials chemistry applied to energy research, and leads a programme of research in the development of porous metal organic frameworks (MOFs) for a variety of applications. He joined The University of Manchester on 1st June 2015 as Vice President and Dean of the Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences and Professor of Chemistry. Prior to this, he was Executive Dean of the Faculty of Science and Professor of Inorganic Chemistry, responsible for leading the Faculty's research and teaching strategies, infrastructure and financial planning.
A Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, he is also currently Principal Investigator for the EPSRC Programme Grant ‘Coordination Chemistry for Energy and our Sustainable Futures' and has previously held ERC Advanced and Proof of Concept Grants. He has won many awards for his research most notably from the Royal Society of Chemistry including the Corday Morgan Medal and Prize (1989), the Tilden Lectureship and Medal (2001), the award for Chemistry of the Transition Metals (2003) and the award for Chemistry of the Noble Metals and their Compounds (2008). He has held a Royal Society Wolfson Merit Award (2005-2010), a Leverhulme Trust Senior Research Fellowship (2006), and was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Tallinn Technical University, Estonia in 2005.
Previously Martin has held a Personal Chair at the University of Edinburgh, and Visiting Professorships at the University of Toronto, the University of Otago in New Zealand, and the Université Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg. He was Lecturer of the Year, Leiden Institute of Chemistry, The Netherlands in 2010 and Guest Special Professor of Wuhan University, China in 2013. He has published 470 papers, reviews and patents.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Governance Board
- Armourers & Brasiers' Chair
Role: Armourers & Brasiers' Chair in Materials Science, Vice Dean (Research) Faculty of Engineering
Mary Ryan is currently Armourers & Brasiers' Chair in Materials Science, and Vice-Dean for Research in the Faculty of Engineering. She joined Imperial in 1998 from Brookhaven National Laboratory in the US where she was assistant scientist in the Materials-Environment Interactions Group. She graduated from Manchester University with a Joint Honours degree in Mathematics and Physics and was then awarded a PhD in Materials Science carrying out early work with in situ electrochemical STM to study passivation phenomena in alloy systems.
Mary leads a large interdisciplinary group focused on understanding nanoscale materials, and nanoscale interfaces in and between materials and their environments. She has a particular interest in the development of operando approaches and has pioneered nanoscale methods in synchrotron science. Her research spans diverse application areas including: energy materials (batteries, magnetocaloric cooling devices, photovoltaics, fuel cells and catalysis); nanomaterials for bio-sensors and therapies; the mechanisms that lead to human and environmental toxicity associated with nanostructures, and the potential of nanomaterials for environmental remediation. A key aspect of this work is understanding the reactivity and stability of nanostructures in operando in order to maximize efficiency and lifetime of devices and systems.
She was elected Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in 2015 and is a Fellow IoM3 and of the Institute of Corrosion.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Programme Management Board
- Senior Advisor
- Senior Advisor Chemical Engineering Applied Sciences, Bp
Role: Senior Advisor Chemical Engineering Applied Sciences
Job Titles:
- Member of the Programme Management Board
- Swanlund Endowed Chair, Head of Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Illinois
Job Titles:
- Member of the Programme Management Board
Job Titles:
- Director
- Member of the Governance Board
- Distinguished Chair
- Professor
- Professor and Grainger Distinguished Chair in Engineering, Director of Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois
Role: Professor and Grainger Distinguished Chair in Engineering, Director of Materials Research Laboratory
Paul V. Braun is the Director of the Materials Research Laboratory, the Grainger Distinguished Chair in Engineering, and Professor of Materials Science and Engineering. He also has a co-appointment as a Professor in Chemistry and is affiliated with the Department of Mechanical Sciences and Engineering and the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology. The Braun group focuses on the synthesis of materials with carefully crafted 3D nano- and mesoscale architectures which lead to emergence of new optical, electrochemical, and thermal functionalities. Recent priority research areas include materials for energy storage, advanced optics, chemical sensing, and the control of heat. Prof. Braun received his B.S. degree with distinction from Cornell University, and his Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Illinois.
Following a postdoctoral appointment at Bell Labs, Lucent Technologies, he joined the faculty of the University of Illinois in 1999. Prof. Braun has co-authored a book, about 300 peer-reviewed publications, been awarded multiple patents, and has co-founded three companies.
He is the recipient of the Illinois MatSE Young Alumnus Award (2011), the Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (2010), the Stanley H. Pierce Faculty Award (2010), the 2002 Robert Lansing Hardy Award from TMS, a Beckman Young Investigator Award (2001), a 3M Nontenured Faculty Award (2001), the Xerox Award for Faculty Research (2004, 2009), and multiple teaching awards. In 2006, he was named a University Scholar by the University of Illinois, in 2011 was named the Ivan Racheff Professor of Materials Science and Engineering, and in 2020 was named a Grainger Distinguished Chair in Engineering. Prof. Braun has served on the editorial advisory boards of multiple journals. He was a member of the 2010-2011 DARPA Defense Science Study Group, and the 2015-2017 National Academies Technical Advisory Board for the US Army Research Laboratory. In 2018 Prof. Braun was elected a Fellow of the Materials Research Society.
Job Titles:
- Director
- Director, the University of Manchester
- Professor of Materials Characterisation at the University
- Professor of Materials Characterisation at the University of Manchester
Sarah Haigh is a Professor of Materials Characterisation at The University of Manchester, UK. She is the Director of ICAM and has projects related to applying advanced electron microscopy for catalysis. She is Director of the Department of Materials Electron Microscopy Centre, which has 25 instruments and over 500 users. She leads a research group centred around improving our understanding of nanomaterials properties using advanced transmission electron microscope (TEM) imaging and analysis techniques. She is particularly interested in the development and application of new methods for high resolution in situ liquid or gas cell TEM imaging and holds an ERC Starter Grant in this area. She has published 4 book chapters, over 200 papers, with >10000 citations and has an H-index of 46.
Before moving to The University of Manchester to start a lectureship in 2010 she worked as consultant application specialist to JEOL UK. She completed MEng and DPhil degrees in Material Science at the University of Oxford. She is a Liveryman of the Armourers and Brasiers Company and sits on their Material Science Committee. She won the IOM3 Silver Medal in 2017 and an RMS Innovation Award in 2018. She was Chair of the Institute of Physics EMAG group (2016-2018) a council member for the RMS (2014-2018), is on the advisory boards for the EPSRC's SuperSTEM laboratory and the NanoDTC at the University of Cambridge.
Sarah Haigh is a Professor of Materials Characterisation at The University of Manchester, where she leads a research group that pioneers cutting edge electron microscopy characterisation in the field of 2D material heterostructures and inorganic nanoparticles.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Governance Board
- Vice President
- Vice President for Materials & Corrosion Engineering, Bp
Role: Vice President for Materials & Corrosion Engineering
Job Titles:
- Member of the Programme Management Board
- Discipline Expert, Bp
Job Titles:
- Operations Manager
- Operations Manager of Bp
- Operations Manager of Bp - ICAM and HSSE Delivery Lead, the University of Manchester
Tracy Amass
Operations Manager of bp- ICAM and HSSE delivery lead, The University of Manchester