New group members!

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After a busy week of settling in, we have finally managed to get (most) of the group together for a new mega-group photo!

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Welcome to all new members – both graduate and undergraduate (EJ, Tom, Callum, and Angus (not on the photo!)) students, including those working with Sebastien (Stella and James)!

Here Charl with all graduate students who started since May – Basiram, Safa, Xue, Dauren and Sam, with Prof Hugh Brady (Vice Chancellor and President of the University of Bristol – not a new PhD student), at a recent PGR welcome event!

Paper with Donghua University, Shanghai!

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A new study, where Charl contributed to on-going collaborative activities with former postdoc (and now professor at Donghua) Yaozu Liao, was published in Chemical Engineering Journal. This study explored modified tetraphenylmethane (TPM)-based POPs i.e. mPTPMs (synthesized via Buchwald-Hartwig cross-coupling of a tetrakis(4-bromophenyl) methane core and selected aryl diamine linkers, followed by a crosslinking alkylation strategy using diiodomethane as a crosslinker).

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This new strategy offers mPTPMs with high surface areas, uniform ultramicropores where porous properties are readily controlled by the substitutions of linkers and the crosslinker. More details on the paper entitled “A crosslinking alkylation strategy to construct nitrogen-enriched tetraphenylmethane-based porous organic polymers as efficient carbon dioxide and iodine adsorbents” to follow soon!

Well done to all involved!

For the Africa we want!

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Charl was privileged to be invited to attend the Royal Society and African Academy of Sciences‘ Connecting Minds Africa 2019 in Nairobi, Kenya.It was a great opportunity to meet a large number of bright and ambitious young academics from all over Africa, including Future Leader-African Independent Researcher (FLAIR) Fellows.

Charl also had the chance to meet his mentee, FLAIR Fellow and up-and-coming academic Professor Balla Diop Ngom from Dakar, Senegal!

Busy week in the FRG – Porous Materials Mini Symposium

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It was a busy week in the Faul Research Group – we hosted a mini symposium with a large number of research groups based in the South West (Bath, Bristol, Cardiff) and active in the broad area of porous materials on Wednesday.

Sebastien did a great job in organising the symposium – thank you! We also received support from the Cabot Institute! The next meeting already planned for early next year!

New record – serving 252 meals at BISC!

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What a fantastic team effort – the Faul Research Group baking, chopping, making and serving more than 250 meals at BISC earlier this week! It was a busy evening, but teamwork at its best!

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Thanks to all who helped (also Esther, Veronica, Sylvia and Matthew, who were unfortunately not on this photo!), including two further volunteers from the School of Chemistry – Prof Tim Gallagher and Dr Justice Archer!

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Charlie’s paper published!

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Congrats to Charlie and all other contributors – our paper in Macromolecules was just published! In this study, entitled “Linear and Branched Fiber-like Micelles from the Crystallization-Driven Self-Assembly of Heterobimetallic Block Copolymer Polyelectrolyte / Surfactant Complexes” we explored the solution self-assembly of a heterobimetallic diblock copolymer with a crystallizable poly(ferrocenyldimethylsilane) (PFS) core-forming block and a corona-forming segment featuring a poly(cobaltoceniumethylene) (PCE)-based polyelectrolyte/surfactant complex.

We found that key features of the one-dimensional (1D) morphologies were dependent on both the polarity of the solvent medium and temperature. Read the paper for more details – the 11th collaborative paper with the Manners group!