Department of Chemistry

portrait of Dr Tim Dickens FRSC

Dr Tim Dickens FRSC

Peterhouse

Groups: COs group website

Telephone: 01223 763811

E-mail: tkd25@cam.ac.uk

Head of IT - Department of Chemistry


General


I lead the IT team within the Chemistry department.  The IT team are responsible for the provision of IT services to all Academic, Administrative and research staff.  In addition we manage the contract that provides IT services to undergraduate teaching within the department through the University Computing MCS service.

All requests for support are handled through a Resource Tracking system.  Metrics are gathered, reported on through the Computer Service Committee and used to identify systemic issue to be tackled through route cause analysis.

A master sheet of all active projects is used to track progress against plan.  The current key themes being:

  1. Ensuring data is held in a resilient and replicated environment
  2. Preservation of and access to experimental results through the deployment of Electronic Notebook
  3. Provision of administrative information to aid the decision making of the department  through linking databases
  4. Improving the user IT experience through a combination of support process improvement; technical simplification; improving communication

I serve or have recently servered on a number committees and initiatives including:

  • The Chemistry Department Strategy working group
  • The Chemistry Research Strategy Committee
  • The Unilever Centre Management team
  • In addition I am the joint coordinator for IT for The School of Physical Sciences.  The key focus of this role is to raise the quality of IT services delivered by the sharing or best practice in IT across the School.

For more information on the IT in Chemistry please see the first article here.

Research Interests


Although I am not employed by the University to conduct formal research I have retained my interest in Theoretical Chemistry for which I was awarded a PhD.  In my day to day job I have the luxury of discussing Chemistry with colleagues as well as keeping abreast of some of the latest developments in the field.

My own academic interest is the study of Dispersion forces and Exchange potentials.  These are particularly relevant in calculating the physical properties of Molecular Crystals such as sublimation energies and packing arrangements.  They are very important in determining the conformation of molecules and calculating the binding energies of compounds at drug receptor sites.

More recently I have been performing NMR Ring Current calculations on various congregate aromatic systems.  This is an application of Graph Theory.   Another application of which that has long fascinated me, is proving non repetition changes in Bell ringing.  Sadly the use of Graph Theory in proving whether a peal is true is in decline as “brute force” computer simulation techniques have become more prevalent.

Prior to joining the University I was at GSK for 24 years.  In the early part of my career I worked in as a Chemist in molecular computer graphics.  Later my career evolved into IT infrastructure management.  I also provide external research degree supervision.  Current themes include Six Sigma process improvement methodology.

Teaching


Currently I am a Fellow at Peterhouse and am Director of Studies in Chemistry for the college.  From October I become an College Lecture in Chemistry.  I supervise the Part IA Chemistry course.  This covers:

1. Shapes and Structures of Molecules - encompassing NMR and IR spectroscopy as well as Quantum Mechanics

2. Reactions and mechanisms in organic chemistry - Nuclophilic Substitution, Electrophilic attack on pi-bonds, carbonyl chemistry.

3. Energetics and Equilibria - Second Law of Thermodynamics entropy, enthalpy, Gibbs energy

4. Kinetics of Chemical Reactions - Reaction rates and rate laws.

5. Chemistry of the Elements - Properties and electronic structure.  Chemical bonding and reactions.

I am also passionate about helping other people with their personal development and currently provide mentoring support to several people within the School of Physical Science.

Personal


I have two children who have broadly followed my wife and myself in studying Modern Languages and Chemistry at University.

I mostly read about Political and Ecclesiastical French and English history between the 12th and 14th century.

In a good week I aim to visit the gym three times!

I play bridge, ring bells and frequently visit the theatre.  I still enjoy travel and listening to organ music.

Publications

A.T. Balaban, T.K. Dickens, I. Gutman, R.B. Mallion, "Ring Currents and the PCP Rule", Croatica Chemica Acta, 83 (2) 209-215 (2010) PDF

By this paper I have an Erdös number of 3 with a multiplicity of 3 as all three co-authors have an Erdös number of 2 which incidentally they have acquired several times over.

T.K. Dickens*, R.B. Mallion, “Topological Ring-Currents in the ‘Empty’ Ring of Benzo-Annelated Perylenes”, J Chem Phys A.- 115 351–356 (2011). DOI: 10.1021/jp1096103

T.K. Dickens*, J.A.N.F. Gomes, R.B Mallion "Some Comments on Topological Approaches to the π-Electron Currents in Conjugated Systems" J Chem Theory and Comp. - 7 3661-3674 (2011). DOI: 10.1021/ct2002539

T.K. Dickens*, R.B. Mallion,"Topological ring-current assessment of the 'annulene-within-an-annulene' model in [N]-circulenes and some structures related to kekulene" Chem Phys Lett 517 (2011) 98-102.  DOI: 10.1016/j.cplett.2011.10.002

T.K. Dickens*, R.B. Mallion,"Topological Ring-Currents and Bond-Currents in Some Non-Alternant Isomers of Coronene" J Chem Phys A 115 (2011) 13877-13884. DOI:  10.1021/jp205964t

TK Dickens, RB Mallion, "π-Electron ring-currents and bond-currents in [10,5]-Coronene and related structures conforming to the 'Annulene-Within-an-Annulene' model"  Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics (2013) 15, 8245.  DOI: 10.1039/c3cp00053b

 

Funding


Funding 

I recently led a short project that is funded by JISC.  The aim of the project was to investigate why the use of electronic laboratory notebooks is pervasive in industry but scarcely used in academia where the mechanism for recording of experimental results and observations have not changed since the days of Isaac Newton.  The co-investigator is Prof. Richard Whitby (Southampton).  Other members of the project team are Dr Gill Cooper, Dr Frank Lee, and Dr Brian Brooks.

Funding Sources 
JISC
Further Funding Information 

 

The main goals of this project are:

  1. To increase the use of the electronic lab notebook in the Chemistry Department at the University of Cambridge
  2. To pilot the use of the ELN with in the Chemistry Department at University of Southampton
  3. To learn the best ways of increasing uptake by encouraging research scientists to change their working practices
  4. To gain insight into differences in working practices between university departments
  5. To learn issues that arise when accessing an ELN remotely
  6. Disseminate the learnings across the community

 

External Links 

For further information on the CamELS project please follow this link:

http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/di_research/researchtools/camels.aspx

 

Publications

π-Electron ring-currents and bond-currents in [10,5]-Coronene and related structures conforming to the 'Annulene-Within-an-Annulene' model
TK Dickens, RB Mallion - Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics (2013) 15, 8245
(DOI: 10.1039/c3cp00053b)
The regular [r, s]-Coronenes and the 'Annulene-Within-an-Annulene' rule
TK Dickens, RB Mallion - RSC Advances (2013) 3, 15585
Topological Ring-Currents and Bond-Currents in Some Nonalternant Isomers of Coronene
TK Dickens, RB Mallion - The Journal of Physical Chemistry A (2011) 115, 13877
(DOI: 10.1021/jp205964t)
Topological ring-current assessment of the 'annulene-within-an-annulene' model in [N]-circulenes and some structures related to kekulene
TK Dickens, RB Mallion - Chemical Physics Letters (2011) 517, 98
(DOI: 10.1016/j.cplett.2011.10.002)
Some comments on topological approaches to the π-electron currents in conjugated systems
TK Dickens, JANF Gomes, RB Mallion - Journal of Chemical Theory and Computation (2011) 7, 3661
(DOI: 10.1021/ct2002539)
Topological Ring Currents in the "Empty" Ring of Benzo-Annelated Perylenes
TK Dickens, RB Mallion - The Journal of Physical Chemistry A (2011) 115, 351
(DOI: 10.1021/jp1096103)
Ring Currents and the PCP Rule
AT Balaban, TK Dickens, I Gutman, RB Mallion - Croatica Chemica Acta (2010) 83, 209
E-WorkBook for Chemistry
T Dickens - Chemistry World (2009) 6, 70