Energy IRC is governed by a Steering Committee and Director Professor Richard Friend. It meets once a term to review the Interdisciplinary Research Centre's activities, evaluate progress and provide strategic guidance in achieving it's goals.
Steering Committee membership is open to academic staff from the Arts and Humanities, Biological Sciences, Humanities and Social Sciences, Physical Sciences and Technology.
Steering Committee
Prof. Abir Al-Tabbaa, Engineering, School of Technology
- Key interests: Intelligent infrastructure materials, soil mix technology, data mining, mapping, modelling and management
Dr Claire Barlow, Engineering, School of Technology
- Key interests: Eco-efficient manufacturing, re-use and recycling, value from waste
Dr Adam Boies, Engineering, School of Technology
- Key interests: Evolution, dynamics and impacts of gas-phase nanoparticles, air quality, transportation emissions and engineered nanoparticles for energy applications.
Prof. David Cebon, Engineering, School of Technology
- Key interests: Dynamic loads of heavy vehicles, heavy vehicle safety and mobility, heavy vehicle fuel consumption and the micromechanics of asphalt deformation and fracture.
Prof. Manish Chhowalla, Materials Science and Metallurgy, School of the Physical Sciences
- Key interests: Fundamental studies of atomically thin two-dimensional transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs), electronic and electrochemical properties, phase transformations in monolayered materials and utilization of phases for catalysis and energy storage.
Prof Ruchi Choudhary, Engineering, School of Technology
- Key interests: Building simulation and environmental characteristics of the built environment, urban-scale energy simulation of built environments, with specific emphasis on uncertainty analysis and retrofits of existing buildings.
Dr Jonathan Cullen, Engineering, School of Technology
- Key interests: Material and energy flows required to support energy, transport, buildings and infrastructure systems.
Prof. Judith Driscoll, Materials Science and Metallurgy, School of the Physical Sciences
- Key interests: Energy efficient oxide materials for ICT and energy devices, nanoscale design and tuning of thin film materials
Prof. Paul Dupree, Biochemistry, School of Biological Sciences
- Key interests: Biosynthesis and function of polysaccharide components of the plant cell wall
Prof Sian E Dutton, Chemistry, School of the Physical Sciences
- Key interests: Properties of complex oxides for energy applications including batteries and solid state magnetic cooling
Prof Adrian Fisher, Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, School of Technology
- Key interests: Microfabrication, fluid dynamics, numerical simulations, spectroscopic analysis and electrochemical methodology, design, manufacture and application to microscale reactor systems for the development of the next generation of (bio)chemical sensors
Prof Shaun Fitzgerald, Engineering, School of Technology
- Key interests: Climate repair, deep and rapid emissions reductions, greenhouse gas removal, targeted interventions to restore specific damaged climate systems, low energy natural ventilation, sustainable building technologies,
Dr Alexander Forse, Chemistry, School of the Physical Sciences
- Key interests: Functional behaviour of new materials for CO2 capture and electrochemical energy storage, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy techniques that are complemented by synthetic chemistry, electrochemistry and computational chemistry
Prof. Sir Richard Friend, Physics, School of the Physical Sciences (Director)
- Key interests: Electronic properties of novel semiconductors, carbon-based organic semiconductors and metal halide perovskites, photovoltaic diodes, FETs, and LEDs, fundamental electronic structure and applications in display technologies and solar cells
Prof Sohini Kar-Narayan, Materials Science and Metallurgy, School of the Physical Sciences
- Key interests: Polymer-based nanomaterials for applications in energy harvesting and sensing, piezoelectric, ferroelectric, magnetoelectric and thermoelectric nanostructures for harvesting and harnessing ambient waste energies for sensing technologies
Prof Srinivasan Keshav, Computer Science and Technology, School of Technology
- Key interests: Reducing the carbon footprint of energy generation, transportation, and buildings. Carbon sequestration and biodiversity potential of forests, both conservation and restoration
Prof Markus Kraft, Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, School of Technology
- Key interests: Computational modelling and optimisation targeted towards developing carbon abatement and emissions reduction technologies for the automotive, power and chemical industries
Dr Teng Long, Engineering, School of Technology
- Key interests: Power electronics, power conversion systems, electric vehicles (cars, trains, ships, aircraft), electrical energy storage, renewable energy, smart grid
Dr Ewa Marek, Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, School of Technology
- Key interests: Energy, energy materials, sustainable production of high-value chemicals and energy vectors, carbon capture, fluidised bed, discrete element modelling, CFD-DEM
Prof David Newbery, Economics, School of the Humanities and Social Sciences
- Key interests: Electricity policy research, specifically market design and behaviour, transmission access pricing, renewables support mechanisms and climate change policy
Dr David Reiner, Judge Business School, School of Technology
- Key interests: National climate change policies; social and political acceptability of low-carbon technologies; public views of fracking, carbon capture and storage technologies, energy demand, policy design; public perceptions of energy technologies, regulatory policy
Prof. Erwin Reisner, Chemistry, School of the Physical Sciences
- Key interests: Solar fuels and chemicals, artificial photosynthesis, biohybrid materials, water and CO2 splitting, catalysis, metalloenzymes, bio-inorganic chemistry, synthetic chemistry, electrochemistry, photoelectrochemistry, functional and energy materials
Dr Sam Stranks, Physics, School of the Physical Sciences
- Key interests: Optical and electronic properties of emerging semiconductors including halide perovskites, carbon allotropes and organic semiconductors for low-cost electronics applications such as photovoltaics and lighting
Dr Laura Torrente, Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, School of Technology
- Key interests: Novel catalytic routes for sustainable technologies, reaction engineering, integration of reaction and separation steps in chemical processes, nanostructured materials as catalytic supports, ammonia as a vector of sustainable hydrogen
Prof Michaël De Volder, Engineering, School of Technology
- Key interests: Scalable processes to arrange nanoparticles such as carbon nanotubes and graphene into well-defined superstructures, applications in sensors, electronics, catalysis, energy storage, water purification, and smart materials
Dr Li Wan, Land Economy, School of the Humanities and Social Sciences
- Key interests: Urban land-use and transport, location and travel choices, inter-disciplinary modelling of urban and infrastructure systems, model-based development policy studies, integration of big data and urban system modelling
Prof Paul Warde, History, School of the Humanities and Social Sciences
- Key interests: Environmental, economic and social history. Natural resource use and its role in shaping working lives, communities, societies and economic development
Cambridge University Energy Network / Cambridge University Energy Technologies Society Representative