Current Group Members
Azucena Jiménez was born in 1976 in Asturias, Spain. She received her degree in Chemistry from the University of Oviedo, (Asturias) in 2001. Then she moved to San Sebastian for her PhD studies in Organic Chemistry in the group of Prof. Palomo under the supervision of Prof. Palomo and Prof. Aizpurua to work on projects involving organic synthesis and conformational analysis of new peptidomimetics. At the beginning of 2010, she won a Basque region postdoctoral fellowship to work in the group of Jonathan Nitschke at the University of Cambridge.
Dr. Jeanne L. Bolliger began her studies in Chemistry at the University of Zurich in 2001 and received her diploma in 2007. Her diploma work was carried out in the research group of Dr. Ch. M. Frech at the Institute of Inorganic Chemistry and led her to new discoveries in the area of palladium chemistry and palladium catalysed cross-coupling reactions. Jeanne continued this research on aminophosphine based palladium pincer complexes in her doctorate which eventually resulted in the commercial availability of one of the palladium pincer complexes.In April 2011, Jeanne joined the group of Jonathan Nitschke as a post-doctoral research associate. She recently won a SNF postdoctoral fellowship which will support her stay in Cambridge.
Dr. Ana Castilla completed her degree in Chemistry in 2002 at the University of the Balearic Islands (Spain). In 2003, she undertook her doctoral studies on the synthesis of a macrocyclic receptorfor the chiral recognition of peptides, under the supervision of Prof. P. Ballester, at the same institution. After obtaining her PhD in November 2008 she joined Dr. A. Kleij’s group at the ICIQ (Institute of Chemical Research of Catalonia) where she worked on the preparation and study of multimetallic salen complexes. Since January of 2011 she is working as a postdoc in the group of Jonathan R. Nitschke at the University of Cambridge.
Tanya Ronson was born in Palmerston North and grew up in Dunedin, New Zealand. She received a Bsc(Hons) degree in chemistry from the University of Otago, Dunedin in 2002 and spent a year working as a research assistant in the group of Dr Sally Brooker. She moved to Sheffield in 2003 to complete a PhD in supramolecular coordination chemistry under the supervision of Prof. Mike Ward at the University of Sheffield and received her PhD in 2006. She then went onto to carry out postdoctoral work on metallo-supramolecular assemblies with stellated polyhedral structures in the group of Dr Michaele Hardie at the University of Leeds from 2007-2009 before taking time out to travel across Asia. She joined the group of Jonathan Nitschke as a postdoctoral research fellow in August 2011.
Jonathan Foster obtained his M.Chem. degree from Durham University in 2008 where he also undertook his doctoral studies with Prof. Jonathan Steed. His research focussed on the design and study of supramolecular gels for applications including controlling crystallisation, drug delivery and the templation of nanoporous polymers. From March 2012 Jonathan will be taking up a post-doctoral position in the Nitschke group.
Airton Salles was born in 1977 in Brazil. He received his PhD in Chemistry from State University of Campinas (UNICAMP) in 2009 under the supervision of Prof. Luiz Carlos Dias working on total synthesis of Pteridic Acid A and B. In 2010, he moved to the group of Prof. Carlos Roque Duarte Correia (UNICAMP) as a postdoc working on separation of enantiomers using Simulated Moving Bed Chromatography and participating in the development of the first asymmetric Heck-Matsuda reaction (in press). In March 2012 he will join the group of Prof. Nitschke as a postdoctoral research fellow working on molecular capsules.
Prakash Neelakandan was born in 1981 in Ernakulam, India. After obtaining his Masters degree in Chemistry, he moved to the research group of Dr. D. Ramaiah at NIIST, Trivandrum for doctoral studies. He was awarded Ph D in 2009 for his research on the design and synthesis of cyclophanes as probes for nucleotides and DNA. Subsequently, he moved to Northwestern University, Evanston to work with Professor Fred Lewis as a postdoctoral fellow. His research at Northwestern was aimed at studying the electronic and self-assembly properties of chromophore functionalized oligonucleotides. Prakash will be taking up a postdoctoral position in the Nitschke group from May 2012.
Quan Gan was born in Wuhan, China, in 1982. He studied chemistry at Central China Normal University, and received his Bachelor Degree in 2005 and his Master Degree in 2008. Then he obtained his PhD in 2012 from Chinese Academy of Sciences (Beijing, China) and University of Bordeaux (Bordeaux, France) under the guidance of Prof. Hua Jiang and Dr. Ivan Huc. During the doctoral research, his work has focused on the design and synthesis of aromatic amide oligomers (foldamers) to mimic the structures and functions of biomacromolecules. In February 2013 he joined the group of Jonathan Nitschke as a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Cambridge.
Emily Dry was born in 1983 in Southampton, England, where she grew up. She received her Master's degree in Natural Sciences from the University of Cambridge in 2007, having carried out a research project in the group of the late Dr Joe Spencer. In October 2008 she commenced studies towards a PhD in Chemistry under the supervision of Jonathan Nitschke.
Imogen A. Riddell was born in 1986 and grew up in the Scottish Borders. She moved to Glasgow to complete her M.Sci. degree and in 2009 graduated from The University of Strathclyde having completed research projects within the labs of Peter Cormack and Duncan Graham. She has also undertaken industrial placements with Novartis and Pfizer, and since October 2009 has been working towards a PhD under the supervision of Jonathan Nitschke.
Shucong Ma was born in Beijing, China. She received her MChem degree from the University of Warwick in 2007. Since then she has been working in a biotech company near Oxford on drug discovery projects. Starting from 2009 she is working towards a PhD in Chemistry at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Jonathan Nitschke.
Rana A. Bilbeisi was born and raised in Amman- Jordan. She obtained her undergraduate degree from Concordia University, Montreal- Canada in 2005. Rana worked at MDS Pharma Services and Merck Frosst as part of her co-op undergraduate degree. She then completed her M.Sc. degree under the supervision of Dr. N. Moitessier at McGill University in 2008. Before starting her PhD with Dr J. Nitschke in October 2009 she had taught chemistry at Kings Academy in Madaba- Jordan.
Salvatore Zarra was born in 1986 in Italy. He received his Master’s degree in Industrial Chemistry from the University of Bologna in July 2010. His final year Master’s degree project was carried out in the group of Professor Giuliano Longoni under the supervision of Dr. Stefano Zacchini working on metal carbonyl clusters. In October 2010 he started his PhD in Chemistry under the supervision of Jonathan Nitschke at the University of Cambridge.
Samuel Black, born in 1987, is from Argyll in the West Highlands of Scotland. He studied for a Masters in Chemistry at the University of Glasgow, during which he completed an industrial placement with Johnson Matthey Catalysts, and a final year research project titled “Targeting Mitochondria in Plasmodium Falciparum Using Atovaquone Analogues” with Dr Richard Hartley. In 2010 he joined the research groups of Prof. Jeremy K. M. Sanders and Dr Jonathan Nitschke as a joint student working on the exploration of Donor-Acceptor interactions in metallosupramolecular structures.
Ching-Wei Chiu was born in Taiwan. He received his Master's degree in Chemistry from the National Taiwan University, having carried out research in the labs of Professor Sheng-Hsien Chiu. After spending a year working on organic synthesis and radical chemistry in Yeun-Min Tsai's group, He started working towards a PhD in Chemistry at the University of Cambridge
Colm Browne was born in Dublin, Ireland. He did his undergraduate studies in Trinity College Dublin completing research projects with Professor John Kelly, Professor Sylvia Draper and Dr. Wolfgang Schmitt working on the synthesis of inorganic materials for carbon capture and gas storage. He started as a PhD student in the group of Dr. Jonathan Nitschke in October 2010.
Chris Wood was born in 1989 and grew up in Muswell Hill, North London. He attended Lady Margaret Hall Oxford and received his Master of Chemistry degree in 2011. His final year was spent in Dr Martin Smith's Group working on hydrogen-bonded photoswitches. He also worked for UCB Celltech and Evotec in their in-house drugs programs during two summer holidays. His hobbies include cooking, squash and photography at which he is an enthusiastic amateur.
Daniel Wood was born in 1987 in Cambridge, UK. He received his Masters in Chemistry from the University of Reading, working under the supervision of Dr Wayne Hayes on 'pH Tuneable Hydrogelators for Water Purification'. In 2011 he started his PhD under the supervision of Dr Jonathan Nitschke and Prof. Jeremy Sanders, working on metalloporphyrin assemblies.
William Ramsay was born and raised in the frozen wonderland of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. I received my Bachelor of Science with Specialization in Chemistry from the University of Alberta in 2011, having worked with research projects within the lab of Dr. Eric Rivard. Coming October of 2011 he will be working towards a PhD in chemistry at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Dr. Jonathan Nitschke.
Derrick Roberts was born in Singapore in 1988 and was raised in Sydney, Australia. From 2007–2010, Derrick undertook a BSc. (Adv) Hons. at the University of Sydney, Australia, for which he was awarded first class honours and the University Medal in Physical/Organic Chemistry. In 2012 he obtained an MSc. in supramolecular polymer chemistry from Sydney University under the supervision of Professors Sebastien Perrier and Maxwell J. Crossley. In 2013, Derrick started his PhD in the Nitschke Research Group on a Gates Cambridge Scholarship studying cooperative behaviour in self-assembled metal–organic cages.
Former Group Members
Yana Hristova (PhD Student) - Postdoctoral researcher in the group of Dr. Pol Besenius at Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster
Maarten Smulders (Postdoctoral researcher) - Postdoctoral researcher (NWO Vebi fellow) at the University of Twente
Asit Patra (Postdoctoral researcher) - Faculty member of National Physical Laboratory, New Delhi
Jack K. Clegg (Postdoctoral researcher) - Lecturer at University of Queensland
Group in 2009
Group in Autumn 2008
