I am delighted to share that I have recently joined the FZU - Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences, to start my independent career as a research scientist in the Department of Magnetics and Superconductors.
At FZU, my vision is to perform excellent research at the forefront of molecular magnetism and to build a dynamic and highly collaborative research group. Our focus will be on spin-switchable molecular magnets and single-molecule magnets for applications in molecular electronics, high-sensitivity magnetic sensing, molecular scale data storage, and quantum technologies such as spin qubits. This will involve:
- Designing and synthesising next-generation molecular magnetic materials with precisely tuned magnetic, electronic, and optical properties.
- Surface immobilisation of molecular magnets to integrate them into functional device architectures.
- Exploring multifunctionality by coupling spin-switching behaviour with conductivity, luminescence and ferroelectricity.
- Fostering cross-disciplinary collaborations between chemists and physicists, to translate fundamental discoveries into real-world technologies.
I look forward to pushing the boundaries of what molecular magnets can achieve.
My academic journey in brief:
My research journey on switchable molecular materials began during my master’s at University College Dublin, Ireland with Prof. Grace Morgan with scholarships from Science Foundation Ireland and Dean’s fee waiver program. I traversed the globe in the interest of Science to New Zealand with prestigious MacDiarmid Institute Scholarship to University of Otago to work with Prof. Sally Brooker on predictable tuning of spin states in solution and photocatalytic CO₂ reduction with molecular materials. On completing my PhD in 2021, I moved to Germany to work under the mentorship of Prof. Eva Rentschler at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz as a postdoctoral researcher. There I developed multifunctional magnetic materials including valence tautomeric cobalt complexes bearing redox active non-innocent ligands and metallacrown based single-molecule magnets. In 2023, I was awarded institutional startup funding to work on molecular materials for green hydrogen production under co-mentorship of Prof. Carsten Streb.
Alongside research, I have over a decade of experience teaching and tutoring undergraduate and postgraduate laboratory courses, and have supervised numerous bachelors’, master theses and co-supervised PhD theses.
I have been honoured with awards such as the Young Environmentalist Award (2011), the Outstanding Member of Dunedin Community Award (2021), and Rising Star Awards at ACMM (2021) and ICST (2023) for my contributions to the field. I am a member of the Royal Society of Chemistry and have actively served to the scientific community, e.g., as Treasurer and Regional Representative for the MacDiarmid Emerging Scientist Association (2020–2021), Executive Committee Member of the IYCN Science Policy Team (2023–Present), and Board Member of the Young Inorganic Chemistry Division of the German Chemical Society (2023–2024).