Dr Joshua Makepeace

Winner: 2023 Environment, Sustainability and Energy Early Career Prize

University of Birmingham

For advancing ammonia-based fuels and hydrogen storage through the use of metal amide and imide materials, ammonia synthesis and decomposition catalysts.

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I'm so grateful that when I arrived in the UK, there were role models of LGBT chemists who I could look to at the top of their game. It was a huge relief.

Dr Makepeace’s research group are developing chemistry to store renewable electricity in a form that is available when and where it is needed. For example, this could be the design of new batteries that are safer and store more energy, or making catalysts which use hydrogen or ammonia as sustainable fuels. The group works with solid materials to understand how their composition and structure governs the way they operate. Everything they do is motivated by the transition to a sustainable energy system.

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Dr Joshua Makepeace hails from Adelaide in South Australia, where he developed a love of tennis, hiking and computer games. He chose to pursue chemistry as part of a BSc (Honours) at Flinders University. His final year research project investigated the effects of organic material on the detection of pesticides in river water.

In 2010, Josh travelled to the UK on a Rhodes Scholarship to pursue doctoral studies in hydrogen storage and ammonia cracking catalysts at the University of Oxford. Following this, Josh spent a year as a project scientist at the ISIS Neutron and Muon Facility developing a laboratory scale demonstrator of ammonia cracking. He then began a Junior Research Fellowship at St John’s College, Oxford. In late 2019 Josh took up a lectureship and a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship in the school of chemistry at the University of Birmingham.

Josh has lived in the UK for over a decade now and appreciates the abundance of public footpaths and the birdlife, even if it isn’t quite as brash and colourful as Australian parrots.

Q&A

How did you first become interested in chemistry?

Chemistry grabbed me because of the combination of getting to do experiments and make new materials with the intellectual challenge of trying to understand the results. As I learnt more about the ways in which chemistry research can contribute to the environmental challenges that we face, I decided that I wanted to pursue it as a career. My interest in chemistry research, specifically, was sparked by an undergraduate research project I was fortunate to conduct in conjunction with the South Australian Museum. I was investigating the structure and composition of some black sand crystals which were found in the logbooks of William Bligh (of mutiny on the Bounty infamy) in order to try and understand where they might have come from on the perilous voyage he undertook from Tahiti to West Timor. It was a fantastic detective story and a great example of the versatility of chemical research.

Tell us about somebody who has inspired or mentored you in your career.

I feel so fortunate to have had people throughout my life who took time to guide me or share their passion. This started back in school with teachers who shared their environmental concerns or fostered my confidence, and continued in my undergraduate. I was the student who always turned up to office hours, and my lecturers were unfailingly patient and encouraging, taking the chance to extend my horizons. In my research career, I'm immensely grateful to Bill David for many inspiring moments over the years which have excited me about the potential of the work I'm doing and instilled a real appreciation for the beauty of solid structures.

What has been a challenge for you (either personally or in your career)?

As an LGBT scientist, I sometimes wondered whether I ever would fully belong in the scientific community. Whilst I don't think my sexuality has a direct relationship with my ability as a scientist, not feeling that sense of belonging certainly hindered my ability to be fully present at work, and made me less comfortable pursuing the career. I'm so grateful that when I arrived in the UK, there were role models of LGBT chemists who I could look to at the top of their game. It was a huge relief.

What does good research culture look like/mean to you?

I think good research is built on an open-minded and rigorous pursuit of knowledge. Beyond that, I would say that good research culture stems from valuing the people who do research. This means celebrating people’s individual ways that they contribute and seeking out diverse viewpoints.

Why do you think teamwork is important in science?

All the best parts of my job involve working with others; it’s the interactions with the students and researchers I work with that put the spark into the day, just having a chat about an interesting result in the corridor or brainstorming future research ideas. Lots of the most exciting science I’ve been involved with is in situ experiments at our central facilities like ISIS and Diamond. They’re incredible monuments to scientific teamwork, and the teams there have been critical to making our experiments a success, from instrument scientists who know their technique inside out to technicians who design and maintain gas equipment. I always feel so privileged that we get to bring along our little samples to these phenomenal facilities.