We are pleased to announce that the winner of the 2013 Clara Immerwahr Award is Dr. Jennifer Edwards of Cardiff University.
Academic Background
Dr. Edwards holds a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry with Biological Science from Cardiff University (2003). During her PhD (Chemistry, Cardiff University School of Chemistry, GB, 2006) she developed numerous novel heterogeneous catalysts and measured their activity for the direct synthesis of hydrogen peroxide from hydrogen and oxygen. During this time she developed a novel Au-Pd catalyst (Patent WO/2007/007075) which showed unprecedented high activity and selectivity for the direct synthesis reaction whilst being inactive for hydrogen peroxide decomposition.
Since completing her PhD Jennifer has worked in the Cardiff Catalysis Institute as a Post-Doctoral Research Assistant (PDRA) on a number of research projects involving catalysis by gold. In 2010 she was awarded a prestigious fellowship from the Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science, and spent some time in Professor Haruta's group at Tokyo Metropolitan University. She has published 3 patents and 41 papers, including 2 in Science. In 2011 she received the Carol Tyler award from the International Precious Metal Institute, which recognized her contributions to precious metal research. She is currently a senior research fellow at the Cardiff Catalysis Institute.
Dr. Edwards says, “I am delighted to have won this award and that my research has been recognized internationally. The award will certainly help to further enhance my independent research work and I am very much looking forward to establishing new and productive collaborations with the high quality scientists who contribute to UniCat.”
Research Interests
Catalysis by gold, AuPd alloys, sub nm metal clusters in catalysis, selective hydrogenation, selective oxidation, utilisation of bio renewable feedstocks, fossil fuel free synthesis of platform chemicals, CO2 utilisation