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17th International conference on materials chemistry (MC17)

7 - 10 July 2025, Edinburgh , United Kingdom


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Introduction

Welcome

You are warmly invited to join us in July 2025. The international conference on materials chemistry has been a key meeting in the materials calendar for three decades.

Organised by the ŷAV, the 2025 conference will host leading materials researchers from around the world. It's the flagship event for the ŷAV Materials Chemistry Community and you can be a part of it.

Oral and poster presentation opportunities are available to researchers of all career stages and we invite you to submit an abstract to make your contribution. The conference promises to be a great forum for materials chemists to network with and build strong collaborations within their community and related disciplines.

Paul Attfield University of Edinburgh and Rachel Evans University of Cambridge
Co-chairs

Themes

For MC17 we have a programme covering materials chemistry in all its breadth and diversity. There are four main themes, listed below. Plenary lectures will highlight advances across the themes and keynote speakers will describe leading work within each theme.

Functional inorganic materials
Experimental and computational studies of inorganic materials with notable mechanical, electronic, optical, magnetic, ferroic, catalytic, conducting or other properties, including novel approaches to prediction, synthesis, characterisation and measurements. 

Materials for energy and sustainability
Experimental and computational studies of materials applied in energy generation, storage and conversion, as well as other areas of sustainability including recycling, critical materials use and green chemistry.

Nano and porous materials
Experimental and computational studies related to the synthesis, characterisation and application of nano-sized materials, micro-, meso- and macroporous materials encompassing porous inorganic, organic and hybrid materials and composites.

Soft matter and biomaterials
Experimental and computational studies related to natural and synthetic soft materials, their characterisation and applications in biotechnology, biomedicine and sustainable technologies.

Useful links

Downloads


Speakers
Eva Blasco, Heidelberg University, Germany

Eva Blasco studied chemistry at the University of Zaragoza (Spain), where she also completed her doctorate. She then received an Alexander von Humboldt Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in 2014, with which she carried out her research in the groups of Prof. C. Barner-Kowollik (Polymer Chemistry) and Prof. M. Wegener (Physics) at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) in Germany. During this time, she spent a research stay in Brisbane (Australia) and subsequently worked as a group leader at KIT. In October 2020, she was appointed Junior Professor at Heidelberg University and in January 2023 she was appointed W3 Professor at the newly founded Institute for Molecular Systems Engineering and Advanced Materials (IMSEAM).
She has published more than 100 publications and has been awarded several prizes (e.g. Ernst-Haage and Dr.-Hermann-Schnell (GDCh) prizes in 2022 or the Young Investigator Award of the Spanish Chemical Society in 2023) and this year with the Advance Science Young Innovator Awards.
Furthermore, Prof. Eva Blasco is project leader (PI) and since October 2023 co-spokesperson in the Cluster of Excellence 3D Matter Made to Order (3DMM2O).
Her research interests include the development of new functional and sustainable polymer materials for 3D and 4D printing, especially on the micro- and nanoscale.


Ross Forgan, University of Glasgow, United Kingdom

Prof Ross Forgan is Professor of Supramolecular and Materials Chemistry at the University of Glasgow. His research into the application of metal-organic frameworks in biomimetic catalysis and nanoscale drug delivery is underpinned by fundamental studies into molecular recognition and self-assembly processes inside nanoporous materials. His work has led to around 100 publications, and been recognised by award of the ŷAV Bob Hay Lectureship in 2020, and the ŷAV Peter Day Memorial Prize in 2024. He is also Chair of the ŷAV Porous Materials Interest Group and Director of the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Diversity Led, Mission-Driven Research.


Nicola Gasparini, Imperial College London, United Kingdom

Nicola Gasparini is a lecturer in Chemistry at Imperial College London. Nicola is a member of the Class of 2020 World Economic Forum Young Scientists and the Centre for Processable Electronics. He made major scientific contributions to the photophysical properties of organic semiconductors, resulting in over 130 publications. His research interests are in organic and perovskite semiconductors, with particular interests in charge transport and recombination processes in solar cells and photodetectors. He received national and international prizes, including the 2024 Materials Chemistry Early Career Prize of the ŷAV and the 2023 Junior PRISM category.


Matthew Gibson, University of Manchester, United Kingdom

Matt holds a Chair in Sustainable Biomaterials at the University of Manchester, UK, in the Department of Chemistry and Manchester Institute of Biotechnology. Matt’s multidisciplinary research group focusses on developing biomaterials for Biotechnology and Healthcare. He has made significant contributions in the areas of cryobiology for the delivery of cells/tissue, and glycobiology in new biosensors. Matt was a Royal Society Industry Fellow with Cytiva (2019-2023), holds an ERC Consolidator Grant, and is co-founder of the biotech spin-out Cryologyx Ltd. Matt has been awarded several ŷAV prizes including the Corday-Morgan, McBain, Dextra and MacroGroup Young Researcher’s medals, and a Horizon Prize.


Pooja Goddard, Loughborough University, United Kingdom

Pooja graduated with a First Class Hons from Coventry University followed by a Ph. D. in Chemistry from the University of Warwick.
She did a series of post-doctoral researcher appointments (2005 – 2015) at Uppsala, Sweden, Bath and Huddersfield respectively. Pooja joined Loughborough as a Lecturer in 2015 and has since held a Royal Academy of Engineering Industry Fellowship. She is a Reader in Materials Modelling and currently holds a Royal Society Industry Fellowship with Echion Technologies LTD. Her research expertise is in advanced modelling of materials for batteries, nuclear decommissioning and solar technologies.  This includes surface and interactions at interfaces.


Grace Han, Brandeis University, United States

Grace Han received her PhD in 2015 at MIT under the guidance of Professor Timothy Swager. She then joined the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at MIT as a postdoctoral associate with Professor Jeffrey Grossman. She is currently an Associate Professor of Chemistry at Brandeis University, and her group’s research focuses on developing molecular photoswitches and photochemistry for solar energy storage and optically-controlled catalyst recycling.
Grace has been awarded honors during her independent career, including 2022 AFOSR Young Investigator Award, 2022 NSF CAREER Award, 2022 Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship, 2023 Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award, 2023 DFG Mercator Fellowship, 2023 DoD DURIP Award, and 2024 ChemComm Emerging Investigator Lectureship Award.


Jun Huang, University of Sydney, Australia

Professor Jun Huang received his PhD from University of Stuttgart in 2008. After his postdoctoral fellow at Georgia Institute of Technology and ETH Zurich, he joined the University of Sydney as a permanent faculty in 2010, moving up the ranks to Professor at Sydney. Jun is the Domain Leader of Materials in Nanoscale at Sydney Nano, Sydney Nano CO2Zero Grand Challenge Champion, and the Academic Leader of University of Sydney – Zhejiang University Joint Lab on Sustainable Environment. His research is to develop emerging nanoporous catalysts and supported nanometal catalysts for more attractive, practical, and cleaner processes using in situ characterization techniques coupled with innovative reaction engineering. Jun has published over 230 journal publications in high-rank Journals. He has been awarded over AU$ 12m research grants and many prestigious awards including ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering Lectureship Award, CCST-IChemE Carbon Capture Outstanding Achievement Award, Australia’s Most Innovative Engineer, and the Vice-Chancellor’s Awards for Excellence Outstanding Research. Jun is the Editor-in-Chief of Materials Today Sustainability, Editorial Group Member of National Science Review, and the Editorial Board member of other high-rank journals.


Hubert Huppertz, University of Innsbruck, Austria

Hubert Huppertz studied chemistry at the University of Bayreuth, Germany. In 1997, he finished his doctorate with a fundamental work on the structural extension of nitridosilicates in the group of Prof. Schnick. Changing to the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich, he conducted his habilitation from 1998-2003 with a chemical focus on high-pressure/high-temperature syntheses. In 2008, he was appointed as full professor for General and Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Innsbruck, Austria. His main research interests are dedicated to the explorative synthetic discovery of new compounds in solid state chemistry, e.g. in the field of new inorganic phosphors. Since 2013, he also fills the position of a Dean of the Faculty of Chemistry and Pharmacy at the University of Innsbruck.


Sebastien Leccomandoux, University of Bordeaux, France

Sébastien Lecommandoux received his Ph.D. (1996) in Physical Chemistry from the University of Bordeaux. After a postdoctoral experience at the University of Illinois (UIUC, USA) in the group of Prof. Samuel I. Stupp, he started his academic career at the Laboratoire de Chimie des Polymères Organiques as Associate Professor in 1998 and was promoted to Full Professor at Bordeaux INP in 2005. He is currently Director of the Laboratoire de Chimie des Polymères Organiques (LCPO-CNRS) and is leading the group “Polymers Self-Assembly and Life Sciences”. His research interests include the design of bio-inspired polymers for biomaterials and pharmaceutical develoment, especially based on polypeptide, proteins and polysaccharide-based block copolymers self-assembly, the design of polymersomes for drug-delivery and theranostic, as well as biomimetic approaches toward design of synthetic viruses and artificial cells. He published over 230 publications in international journal, 6 book chapters and 12 patents (3 being licenced, 1 start-up created Doxanano). He is also co-director of the joint laboratory LCPO-L'OREAL. Sébastien Lecommandoux is recipient of the CNRS bronze medal (2004), Institut Universitaire de France Junior Chair (IUF 2007), Fellow of the ŷAV ŷAV (2017), French Academy of Science Chemistry Seqens Award (2019), Member of the Academia Europaea (2020), XingDa Lectureship Award from Peking University (2021). He currently holds the Chaire annuelle Innovation technologique Liliane Bettencourt, Collège de France (2024-2025). He is Editor-in-Chief of Biomacromolecules (ACS) since 2020 after serving as Associate Editor since 2013. He is also in the Editorial Advisory Board of several international journals, including Bioconjugate Chemistry (ACS), Polymer Chemistry (ŷAV) and Biomaterials Science (ŷAV).


Julien Nicholas, University of Paris-Saclay, France

Julien Nicolas received his PhD degree in 2005 from the University Pierre and Marie Curie. After a postdoctoral position at the University of Warwick, he obtained in 2007 a permanent CNRS researcher position at Institut Galien Paris-Saclay and got promoted Director of Research at CNRS in 2016 and group leader in 2019. His current research activities lie in advanced macromolecular synthesis and in the design of innovative polymer-based nanomedicines, in particular polymer nanoparticles and polymer prodrug nanocarriers for anticancer therapy. He is (co)author of more than 125 peer review articles in international journals, 7 patents and 13 book chapters. He serves as Associate Editor for Chemistry of Materials (ACS) and is part of the Editorial Advisory Board of ACS Macro Letters (ACS), Macromolecules (ACS) and Polymer Chemistry (ŷAV). He received the 2016 SCF/GFP award, the 2017 Polymer Chemistry Lectureship award, the 2017 Novacap Prize of the Academy of Science, the 2018 Biomacromolecules/Macromolecules Young Investigator Award and the Prix des Innovateurs de la Région Île-de-France in 2023.


Emily Pentzer, Texas A&M University, United States

Emily Pentzer is Professor of Chemistry and Materials Science and Engineering at Texas A&M University, USA where she is also a Presidential Impact Fellow. Her work addresses the design, synthesis, and application of composite polymer materials for energy related applications, converging synthesis and processing. Prof. Pentzer currently serves as the inaugural Editor in Chief of ŷAV Applied Polymers (since 2023) and is a member of the 3rd cohort of the New Voices program at the US National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine.


Karsten Reuter, Fritz-Haber-Institut der MPG, Germany

Prof. Karsten Reuter is Director of the Theory Department of the Fritz Haber Institute (FHI) of the Max Planck Society in Berlin, Germany. He specifically works on multiscale models that combine predictive-quality first-principles techniques with coarse-grained methodologies and machine learning to achieve microscopic insight into the processes in working catalysts and energy conversion devices. Karsten did his doctoral studies on theoretical surface physics in Erlangen, Madrid and Milwaukee. Following research experiences at the FHI in Berlin and the FOM Institute in Amsterdam, he headed an independent Max Planck Research Group. From 2009 to 2020 he was Chair for Theoretical Chemistry at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). He recently held visiting professorships at Stanford (2014), MIT (2018), and Imperial College London (2019), and is a Distinguished Affiliated Professor at TUM as well as Honorary Professor at the Free University and Humboldt University in Berlin.


Yuichi Shimakawa, Kyoto University, Japan

Yuichi Shimakawa is a professor at Institute for Chemical Research, Kyoto University, Japan. He received his Ph.D. from Kyoto University in 1991. He is currently the Director of the Institute. His expertise is in solid-state chemistry and materials science, and his main research interests are in the functional properties of novel transition-metal oxide materials. He has been awarded the Honda Research Award in 1994, the Thomson Scientific Research Front Award in 2007, the Chemical Society of Japan Award for Creative Work in 2013, the Daiwa-Adrian Prize in 2016, the Commendation for Science and Technology in 2017, and the Yazaki Memorial Foundation for Science and Technology Award in 2021.


Ludmilla Steier, University of Oxford, United Kingdom

Ludmilla is an Associate Professor of Inorganic Chemistry and the Goodenough Tutorial Fellow at Saint Catherine’s College. She obtained her B.Sc and M.Sc. degrees in Chemistry from the University of Siegen (Germany). Already during her undergraduate studies she developed an interest in electrochemistry and semiconductor physics driving her to pursue her M.Sc. final project on dye-sensitized solar cells in the group of Professor Michael Grätzel at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL, Switzerland). Staying in the same group, she worked on oxide thin film photoelectrodes applied in photoelectrochemical water splitting and perovskite solar cells during her Ph.D. degree which she obtained in 2016. 
Ludmilla joined the group of Professor James Durrant at Imperial College London to study photochemical and photophysical processes in semiconductors using time-resolved spectroscopy and shortly after was awarded the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship (2017-2019). Ludmilla began her independent research career as Imperial College Research Fellow (2019-2021) before moving to Oxford in October 2021. 
Ludmilla was awarded the 2023 Materials Chemistry Early Career Prize from the ŷAV for seminal contributions to the understanding of defect chemistry in semiconducting materials and interfacial energetics in photocatalytic and photovoltaic devices.  
Her group’s research at Oxford aims at the design of atomically defined photo- and electrocatalysts that convert CO2, water and other “waste products” to energy-rich fuels and chemicals with high conversion efficiency, selectivity and long operational stability which they pursue thanks to funding by the UKRI (for the ERC Starting Grant), SCG Chemicals, the Royal Society, the John Fell Fund and the University of Oxford.  


Felice Torrisi, Imperial College London, United Kingdom

Felice Torrisi is a Senior Lecturer in Chemistry of 2D materials in the Department of Chemistry at Imperial College London, UK. He is an executive board member of the Centre for Processable Electronics the, Institute for Digital Molecular Design and Fabrication and the EPSRC E-Textile network. His research interests cover graphene and related two-dimensional materials for flexible electronics and photonics, with particular focus on energy, sensing, wearable electronics and bioelectronics. In his career, he received the Schlumberger Research Fellowship, the Parmee Prize for Entrepreneurship and Enterprise and the Harrison-Meldola award by the ŷAV. He co-autored more than 75 publications, receiving > 11000 citations, and is the co-founder of three start-ups in the area of graphene, printed electronics and electronic textiles. He contributed to the development of the Science and Technology roadmap for Graphene.


Katherine Villa, Institute of Chemical Research of Catalonia (ICIQ-CERCA), Spain

Katherine Villa completed her Ph.D. in Chemistry at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. After two research positions at the Catalonia Energy Research Institute and the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia, she joined the Center for Advanced Functional Nanorobots in the Czech Republic, where she worked as a senior scientist for 3 years. Prof. Villa currently leads the "Advanced Photocatalytic Materials" research group at the Institute of Chemical Research of Catalonia (ICIQ). Her scientific trajectory has been recognized by several awards and distinctions, including the EuChemS Lecture Award by the European Chemical Society, Young Researcher Award by the Spanish ŷAV, appointed member of the Young Academy of Spain, among others. Furthermore, she has secured international competitive funding, including a prestigious ERC Starting Grant 2022 for her project “PhotoSwim”. Her research interests include light-driven micro/nanomotors, nanomaterials, renewable energy, and environmental remediation.                     


Minghui Yang, Dalian University of Technology, China

Minghui Yang, FŷAV, is a Professor at Dalian University of Technology. He earned his M. Chem. degree from the University of Liverpool and completed his Ph.D. in Materials Chemistry at the University of Edinburgh in 2010 under Professor J. Paul Attfield. Following postdoctoral research at Cornell University with Professor Francis J. DiSalvo, he has received numerous awards including the National Overseas High-Level Talents (Youth Project) (2013) and the Zhejiang National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars (2019). With 263 publications in SCI journals and 21 patents, He leads the Solid State Functional Materials Lab at DUT and CAS. His research focuses on solid-state materials for catalysis and sensing.


  • Manish Chhowalla University of Cambridge, United Kingdom
  • Serena Cussen University College Dublin, Ireland
  • Luisa de Cola Università degli Studi di Milano, Italy
  • Kalpana Katti North Dakota State University, United States
  • Krishna Muralidharan University of Arizona, United States
  • Paul Wright University of St Andrews, United Kingdom

Abstract submission

Oral abstracts

Submit your oral abstract before 27 January 2025 under one of the four themes:
  • Functional inorganic materials
  • Materials for energy and sustainability
  • Nano and porous materials
  • Soft matter and biomaterials
While MC17 is organised into these four broad themes, we acknowledge that materials chemistry is a multidisciplinary field and some topics may fall into more than one theme. Abstracts are welcomed in all areas of materials chemistry – when submitting your abstract please choose the theme most relevant to you.

Poster abstracts

Submit your poster abstract by 28 April 2025. Posters are displayed throughout the meeting. A poster prize will be awarded to the best poster presented at the conference.

Additional information

Authors will be notified of the outcome of the review process within about 10 weeks of the oral submission deadline, and 4 weeks of the poster submission deadline. Please ensure you provide the details of the presenting author.
Registration
In-person registration includes:
  • Attendance at all scientific sessions
  • Attendance at the poster sessions on Monday 7 July and Tuesday 8 July
  • Access to recordings of all scientific sessions post-event
  • In-person networking opportunities
  • Refreshments throughout the meeting, lunch on all four days
Please note accommodation is not included in the registration fee.

All prices quoted do not include VAT, which is added during registration at the prevailing rate in the UK
 
Early bird Standard
Non-member £535+VAT £585+VAT
ŷAV member £435+VAT £485+VAT
Student non-member £285+VAT £335+VAT
Student ŷAV member £235+VAT £285+VAT
Accommpanying person £150+VAT £150+VAT
Conference dinner TBC TBC

Virtual registration includes:
  • Live access to all plenary sessions
  • Access to recordings of all scientific sessions post-event
All prices quoted do not include VAT, which is added during registration at the prevailing rate in the UK
 
Standard
Non-member £160+VAT
ŷAV member £130+VAT
Student non-member £90+VAT
Student ŷAV member £75+VAT
 

ŷAV members and student ŷAV members

If you are a ŷAV member and wish to register for this meeting, please select the member option on the online registration page. You will need to enter your membership number.

Non-member and student non-members

For non-member registrants, affiliate membership of the ŷAV until the end of 2025 is available. The affiliate membership application will be processed and commence once the registrant has attended the event. 

Student delegates

In order to encourage undergraduate or postgraduate students to attend the conference, a reduced conference fee is available for students. This fee applies to those undertaking a full-time course for a recognised degree or a diploma at a university or equivalent institution.

Conference banquet

The conference banquet will be held on Wednesday 9 July 2025. Further details to be provided soon.

Accompanying person

If you would like to bring a guest to the conference, this can be done during the registration process. There will be an additional charge, which will include all lunches, refreshments and drinks receptions. The fee does not include attendance at any scientific sessions or the conference dinner - which can be added on during registration for an additional fee.

Accessibility

The ŷAV is keen to encourage and enable as many people as possible to attend our events, to benefit from the networking opportunities and the chance to hear talks from leaders in the field. If you would like to discuss accessibility, or have childcare, caring responsibilities or other care needs, please contact us to discuss your requirements so that we can enable your attendance. Please refer also to our Grants for Carers fund; for more information please see the ‘bursaries’ section on this page.

Terms and Conditions for Events run by the ŷAV

Bursaries

Grants for carers

With our Grants for carers, you can apply for up to £1,200 per year to help you attend a chemistry-related meeting, conference or workshop or a professional development event. This money would be used to cover any additional costs you incur, paying for care that you usually provide.  Please visit the website for further information and eligibility criteria.

Accessibility grants

With our Accessibility grants, you can apply for up to £1,200 per year to help with the cost of specific support to attend a chemistry-related meeting, conference, workshop or professional development event. This support might be any form of equipment, service, or other personal expense associated with meeting your access needs.

Researcher development grant

If you are an ŷAV member and you are one of the following:a PhD student actively undertaking a PhD course in the chemical sciences;
a researcher in the chemical sciences (including post docs, research technicians and research assistants), working in academia, industry or any sector, within 10 years of leaving full time education (at the time of the application deadline).You can apply for up to £500 to support your participation in this event.

Please note it is not necessary to have confirmation of abstract acceptance before applying for a Researcher Development and Travel Grant and we encourage you to apply as early as possible.
 
Please see the website for up-to-date information on eligibility, how to apply and submission deadlines.
 
Researcher Development and Travel Grants can be applied for in addition to Grants for Carers and Assistance Grants.

Sponsorship & supporting organisations
A selection of sponsorship opportunities are available for companies who would like to promote their activities at the 17th International conference on materials chemistry (MC17).

As well as booking an exhibition space, there are opportunities to sponsor social events or advertise in the abstract book. A sponsorship menu document will be available to download from this page with more details and prices soon.

If you would like more information about sponsoring the 16th International conference on materials chemistry (MC17), please contact the Commercial Sales Department at the ŷAV on advertising@rsc.org Sponsorship menu
Venue
Edinburgh International Conference Centre

Edinburgh International Conference Centre, The Exchange, 150 Morrison St, Edinburgh , EH3 8EE, United Kingdom

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