Ben, Alex and Carl attended the 17th CNRS Colloquium on Anisotropic Self-Organised Systems, held in Autrans in France, 8 – 11 September (with generous support from the Bristol Alumni Foundation – thanks!). They had a great time discussing their science with physicists and chemists, including our close collaborators Olli Ikkala and Patrice Rannou (who also was one of co-organizers).
Finally, we heard recently that Carl won one of six poster prizes! Well done Carl!
Wei, a China Scholarship Council exchange student, will spend one year in Bristol. She follows in the footsteps of Jiangtao (Feng), also from the laboratories of prof Yan, who spent a year in Bristol in 2011.
Close interaction and collaboration already exists between the Yan and Faul groups, with a number of publications generated in the area of oligo(aniline)-based nanomaterials (and more to come soon!). Welcome to Bristol!
Peter presented his work at a poster session on Friday evening at ChinaNANO 2015 as part of the BCFN trip to China, and won one of only 22 poster prizes for ALL posters presented at the conference! In a double win for the School of Chemistry, Jason Potticary (from the Hall group), also won a poster prize! Well done!
Bai, who obtained his undergraduate degree from the College of Chemistry, Jilin University, successfully passed his oral examination (viva) for his MSc earlier this week. He did a great job, impressed the examiners, and, in addition, looked very smart!
Well done Bai! Very well deserved!
Elizabeth (Ruiz Garduno) is visiting the FRG, hosted by the BCFN, for 6 weeks (until mid September). She is currently a Masters student from the Institute of Materials, UNAM (National Autonomous University of Mexico), Mexico City. Contact was established with the FRG during Charl’s previous trips to Mexico.
Although her research work in Mexico is focussed on the preparation of nanostructured inorganic materials, she is gaining experience in the preparation of porous conjugated materials during her stay in Bristol. Welcome!
James and Charl are in Prague attending the Functional Nanomaterials 2015 conference, held at the Department of Chemistry, Charles University. Charl might have given an invited keynote lecture, but …
James won the second prize for his poster entitled “Two-Dimensional Self-Assembly of Oligo(aniline)s: a Scanning Tunneling Microscopy Study”! Well done James!
It was a sad occasion when we said goodbye to Yaozu, who is about to head back to China. Hard to believe that the two years have passed so quickly! We said goodbye in true FRG style … by having a meal at Cosmo!
We also took this opportunity to say goodbye to Irrum (who spent 6 very productive months in the FRG) and Eugenie (who spent 6 weeks in the FRG)!
We hope to see all of you back soon again, and look forward to continued contact and collaborations!
Charl is currently in Japan, visiting Prof Kazuo Akagi (in Kyoto, and former PhD supervisor of Kazu in the FRG) to discuss future Bristol-Kyoto interactions. The visit so far has been very productive, including meeting Dr Reiko Oda (from Bordeaux), who gave a fascinating talk on chirality in amphiphilic systems.
The day of interactions was celebrated … with Japanese green-tea-containing beer, whilst learning about the famous Kyoto Gion Festival.
Charl will still be visiting Prof Fumio Sanda (Kansai University) and Prof Tsuyoshi Kawai (Nara Institute of Science and Technology) before returning the Bristol at the end of the week.
Not only did we celebrate Pete‘s birthday (congrats!), but the final year PhD students also gave talks within the School of Chemistry last week.
Ben, Carl and James all gave excellent talks. At the wine reception at the end of the day Professor Paul Pringle (Head of the Inorganic and Materials Chemistry section) announced that Ben was one of two prizewinners for the day! Well done Ben!
Rico, a graduate from Bristol, returned to the chemistry lecture theatres to give a lecture rather than receive one! His talk on functional, fluorinated and unconventional surfactants highlighted his group‘s current research at the School of Chemistry, Monash University, Australia.
It was fantastic to have a great academic visit the department and interact with the group!
Faul Research Group 