Meet the Team
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​Tom Penfold
ORCID: 0000-0003-4490-5672
Tom Penfold was appointed Lecturer in Theoretical and Computational Chemistry at Newcastle University in September 2015. This followed a 2-year Research Scientist position within the SwissFEL project at the Paul Scherrer Institute, Switzerland. Tom's research focuses upon developing and exploiting methods for simulating and understanding excited state dynamics.

Further Information can be found here or at ResearchGate.
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Postdoctoral Researchers

​Julien Eng (2017-Present)
ORCID: 0000-0002-7118-7242
Julien obtained his PhD in theoretical chemistry in 2015 at the Laboratoire de Chimie Quantique at the University of Strasbourg. He then spent a year as research assistant at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Energy Conversion studying spin dynamics of single molecule magnets. Since 2017, he has been a research assistant at Newcastle University in the Penfold group. His current interests are the photoexcited mechanism of thermally activated delayed fluorescence emitters from both the quantum chemical and quantum dynamical perspectives.

Further Information can be found here

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Conor Rankine (2019-Present)
Conor was appointed as an EPSRC Doctoral Prize Research Fellow at Newcastle University in 2019. He joined the Penfold Group following his postgraduate studies in the Wann Group at the University of York (UK), and brings his experience of working at the interface of experiment and theory to his new appointment. Conor is leading the development and application of machine-learning methods for predicting X-ray spectra, and he is interested in the wider applications of artificial intelligence across the physical sciences and beyond. He continues his own independent research into ultrafast photochemistry using quantum chemical calculations and mixed quantum-classical molecular dynamics. 

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Thomas Pope  (2021-Present)
ORCID: 0000-0001-7552-9812
Tom obtained his PhD in theoretical condensed matter physics in 2013 in the Lambert group at Lancaster University. Following this, he spent 18 months as a research assistant at the University of Catania studying quantum dynamics. In 2016, he moved to Newcastle University to develop a novel orbital-free density functional method to solid state calculations in the Hofer group. Since 2021, he has been a research associate in the Penfold group developing kinetic Monte-Carlo software.

Further Information can be found here
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Postgraduate Students

​Beth Laidlaw (2017-Present)
Beth graduated with her MChem(Hons) from Newcastle University in 2017 and is now studying for her PhD in the Penfold Group. Her current research uses molecular dynamics and quantum mechanics and is in collaboration with CYNORA GmbH. The focus of this work is improving the efficiency of thermally activated delayed fluorescence for applications in OLEDs.

Further information can be found here

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​Yang Cao (2018-Present)

Yang Cao joined the Penfold group as a PhD student in 2018 after obtaining his MSc in Drug Chemistry from Newcastle University in 2017. Yang's research is focused upon developing a proton transfer mechanism for achieving efficient thermally activated delayed fluorescence.

Further information can be found here

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Marwah Madkahli (2018-Present)

Marwah graduated with her MChem from Western Iliinois University in 2016. She joined the Penfold group as a PhD student in September 2018. Marwah is researching the theory of X ray absorption spectroscopy. This focuses on the applications of X-ray spectroscopy to battery materials.

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Miriam Fsadni (2019-Present)

Miriam received her BSc(Hons) from the University of Malta in 2015.  After working for a CRO and pursuing an MPhil in chemistry at Newcastle University part-time, she joined the Penfold group as a PhD student in 2019. Miriam's research is focused on the rational design of organic hole transporter materials for use in hybrid perovskite solar cells.

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Shawana Ahmad (2020-Present)

Shawana completed her MPhil in experimental particle physics from Quaid-e-Azam University, Pakistan in 2013. During her MPhil project, she worked at CERN, Switzerland in 2012. In 2020, she joined the Penfold group as a Ph.D. student. Her current research interest is to combine several theoretical methods to describe exciton formation relevant in the context of OLEDs. The focus of this work is on achieving an efficient and narrow TADF emitter

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Luke Watson (2020-Present)

Luke received his MChem from Cardiff University in 2020 and joined the Penfold group in September 2020 as PhD student. His research involves advancing the analysis of X-ray Spectroscopy using machine learning. The focus on this work is to apply a deep neural network to rapidly predict L2-edge Platinum XANES spectra

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Past Group Members
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Yvelin Giret (2018-2021) Postdoctoral Researcher
Thomas Northey (2016-2019) Postdoctoral Researcher
Theo Keane (2018-2019) Postdoctoral Researcher
Emanuele Falbo (2018-2021) PhD Student
​Josh Littlefair (2016-2021) PhD Student
Jamie Gibson (2015-2019) PhD Student
​​Stuart Thompson (2015-2019) PhD Student
​Joash Alonso (2017-2018) MChem Project Student
Joseph Duffield (2017-2018) MChem Project Student
Connor Shield (2017-2018) MChem Project Student
​Helen Duckworth (2015-2016) MChem Project Student
Beth Laidlaw (2016-2017) MChem Project Student
Jess Stacey (2016-2017) MChem Project Student