The Sustainable Polymers in Liquid Formulations Annual Summit

Charlotte Williams is a professor of Inorganic Chemistry and an EPSRC Established Career Research Fellow in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Oxford.  Her research interests lie in polymerization catalysis, inorganic and polymer chemistry.   She is particularly focussed on carbon dioxide utilization by copolymerization and on the production of bio-derived polyesters, polycarbonates and block polymers.  She is a Fellow of the Royal Society. Her work has been recently recognised by the Leverhulme Medal of the Royal Society (2022), The Royal Society of Chemistry Tilden Medal (2021), an OBE for Services to Chemistry (2020), Macro Group UK Medal (2019), DeChema Otto Roelen Catalysis Medal (2018), The UK Catalysis Hub Sir John Meurig Thomas Medal (2017) and the Royal Society of Chemistry Corday Morgan Medal (2016).

Peter is Head of Chemistry & Industrial Biotechnology at Innovate UK Business Connect where one of his key roles is to identify, develop and deliver innovation programmes & activities where chemistry and industrial biotechnology can play a key enabling role to accelerate innovation for the benefit of UK plc.
 
Peter has a detailed understanding of the innovation ecosystem, as well as a powerful network of connections. He has a detailed understanding of key challenges and opportunities for innovators in chemistry & industrial biotechnology and works closely with Innovate UK, and other stakeholders from Government and the private sector, to develop new programmes & initiatives that will help the UK to prosper from Net Zero.
 
Peter holds a PhD in Chemistry from the Clean Technology Group at University of Nottingham. Prior to joining Innovate UK Business Connect in 2015, Peter spent more than eight years in Australia gaining a broad range of experience by working across research & innovation, industry consulting and advocacy, and managing sustainability programmes for the chemicals sector.

Jen graduated from The University of Sheffield, with a first-class Masters of Biological Sciences in 2004 and a PhD in Biochemistry in 2007. With a 20-plus year progressive career in biotechnology, spanning both higher education and the commercial sector, Jen has held roles in research and development, sales and marketing, business development, and business change and transformation. Jen is currently the COO of the Bio-based and Biodegradable Industries Association (BBIA), which exists to champion the industrial bioeconomy to accelerate the development and adoption of bio-based and biodegradable materials and products through advocacy, collaboration, and education. The BBIA's vision is for a more sustainable future, where the UK is a global leader in developing, manufacturing, using and exporting bio-based and biodegradable solutions. Jen also runs her own successful biotechnology consultancy, FREY, which provides expert advice in business development, fundraising, stakeholder engagement, strategic partnerships, policy development, marketing & communications and project management for the biotech sector. 

Matthew Davidson is Whorrod Professor of Sustainable Chemical Technologies, Executive Director of the University of Bath Institute of Sustainability and Climate Change and Executive Director of the Innovation Centre for Applied Sustainable Technologies. His research focuses on the application of molecular chemistry and catalysis to sustainable chemical processes such as manufacture of renewable fuels, chemicals and plastics. He graduated in Chemistry from the University of Wales, Swansea and received a PhD from the University of Cambridge. Following a Research Fellowship at St John’s College, Cambridge, he held Lectureships in Chemistry at the University of Cambridge and Durham University before being appointed to a Chair of Chemistry at Bath in 1999. Much of his work involves close collaboration with industry and he has held a Royal Society Industry Fellowship. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and a previous recipient of its Harrison Memorial Prize.

Dr Amy Goddard obtained her PhD in Polymer Chemistry from the University of Nottingham, and has over 12 years of industrial experience, designing products for a wide range of business markets across the Consumer Care and Life Sciences sectors. Amy is a Research and Technology Manager for Synthesis and Analytical at Croda, and currently has responsibility for strategic development of chemistry platforms across the business, where sustainability is a topic of significant importance.

Steve’s research focuses on sustainable chemistry and in particular on the utilisation of supercritical carbon dioxide for polymer synthesis, polymer processing and preparation of novel polymeric materials. He has published over 330 peer reviewed papers in this field and graduated 63 PhD students. Most recently the focus has been upon 3-D printing and the development of new monomers and polymers from renewable resources.
 
Steve is Professor and Head of the School of Chemistry at the University of Nottingham. He held a Royal Society University Research Fellowship (1991-1999) and a full Chair since 2001.  He has received several awards including the Jerwood-Salters’ Environment Award for Green Chemistry (2001); RSC Corday – Morgan Medal and Award (2001);  Royal Society – Wolfson Research Merit Award (2003); RSC Interdisciplinary Award (2005); DECHEMA-Award of the Max Buchner Research Foundation (2006); RSC/SCI Macro Group UK Medal (2008); and the Hanson Medal of the IChemE (2009).

Chris Finnegan (MPhil) is a Safety and Sustainability Science Leader and one of Unilever’s foremost experts in environmental fate of ingredients. Chris has been with Unilever for 35 years with over 30 years in the field of environmental risk assessment and more specifically determining the fate and biodegradability of Unilever's chemical portfolio as well as supporting Unilever science and technologies programmes for safe and sustainable design innovations. Externally, Chris has published in these areas and has also participated in cross industry task forces for the advancements of biodegradability test methods and env risk assessment of chemicals with the CEFIC LRi programme, ECETOC and AISE. 

Andreas Künkel studied biology in Marburg (Germany) and did his PhD work at the Max-Planck-Institute for terrestrial Microbiology in Marburg. Having joined BASF in 1999 in the company´s biotech department, he has been afterwards in various marketing positions for Fine Chemicals and ecoflex® & ecovio® with focus on strategy and New Business Development. Since 2010 he is head of biodegradable and biobased polymer research and is now leading as executive expert and Vice President a corporate program for biodegradable and biobased materials. 

Christian is currently Head of Advocacy Chemical Recycling at BASF. He holds a PhD in chemistry and started his industrial career at BASF’s R&D for functional polymers. After gaining experience in marketing he joined the Corporate Sustainability Team as an LCA analyst. After as consultant, he implemented BASF’s sustainability strategy in the palm-based portfolio of the Care Chemicals division. After that, he was promoted to lead expert for Circular Economy, coordinating all Corporate mass balance topics inside and outside BASF. In this position he did pioneering work on the upscaling of Biomass Balance in consumer applications and assessing the environmental impacts of chemical recycling, including life-cycle assessments (LCA). In his current position as Head of Advocacy Chemical Recycling, Christian is responsible for all topics relevant for regulation and standardization around chemical recycling. He holds several positions as chair in technical working groups, e.g. in industry, mass balance certification and standardization.

Duncan Lugton is Head of Policy and Impact at the Institution of Chemical Engineers (IChemE). IChemE is the UK based and internationally recognised qualifying body and learned society for chemical, biochemical and process engineers,representing over 30,000 members worldwide. Duncan has worked in a range of policy areas including justice reform and health. He has a BA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from the University of Oxford and an MA in Philosophy from Brandeis University. 

Mark has 30 years’ experience of data analytics, data management, lab automation and instrumentation development, gained from the academic, SME and large corporate sectors. At CPI he established a team focusing on application of a number of digital technologies in service of industrial formulation, including high throughput experimentation, process analytics and model-based process control, and data analytics. His current role as Chief Technologist is leading the further strategic and collaborative development of these technologies and horizon-scanning for digital technologies that can be applied for benefit of UK industry.

Dr Ashmita Randhawa is a biomedical engineer turned social scientist. Having worked in corporate R&D for Procter & Gamble for over 6 years formulating consumer goods products, she pivoted career and discipline to focus on understanding the impact of policymaking on the development of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) skills, completing her PhD at University of Oxford; here she focused on understanding how education and policy systems can have an impact on educational innovation.

She is currently the Director of R&D at Sunderland Software City and leads the work for the Digital Catapult in the North East & Tees Valley, supporting businesses on their digital transformation journeys. She is also an Honorary Research Fellow at the SKOPE Research Centre, University of Oxford and Visiting Professor at the National Innovation Centre for Data, Newcastle University.

Lia Argentou is a Senior Polymer & Formulation Scientist within the health Science platforms team at Reckitt. She has a chemical engineering background with 8 years’ experience in end-to-end product development and innovation; completed both her PhD (formulation engineering) and post doc (chemistry of cleaning knowledge transfer) at Procter & Gamble in collaboration with the University of Birmingham. For the past 3 years she has been working on upstream innovation projects with specific focus on enabling sustainable product development and utilising digital tools as an ally for innovation.

Tanya joined the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2018. As Head of Policy and Evidence, she is responsible for a portfolio of research, policy and responsive work. The aim: to advise decision makers on what they can do so that the chemical sciences community can
make the world a better place. Tanya has extensive experience of making and implementing public policy. As a civil servant in the UK Government, she developed policy and advised Ministers on energy, employment law, European Union, small business and industry, with a largely economic policy focus.

Before joining the RSC, Tanya worked for Cambridgeshire County Council, leading economic development programmes and advising elected Councillors. She holds post-graduate degrees in European Studies and Business Administration.

Anna is passionate about designing and facilitating systems change programmes that support people, communities and organisations transform their practice. In 2016, she launched the School of System Change, which is seeking to build an international learning community of change makers using systemic practices to address the complex challenges of our times. Anna has coached and lead inquiries on a wide number of projects and initiatives across sectors and systems – for example the Marine CoLab and #Oneless project, Unilever’s theory of systems change, Bosch Foundation strategies, Scottish Climate Assembly and Boundless Roots Community. Anna is the author of Cultivating System Change: A Practitioner's Companion which is based on her PhD.