Graduates of the School of Biological and Chemical Sciences go on to do amazing things.
Harriet Judah studied both her undergraduate and postgraduate degrees with us. She graduated from our MSc Chemical Research programme in 2019 and went on to work as a Nanotechnology Scientist at Applied Nanodetectors LTD before progressing to do a PhD at Imperial College London.
Here, she shares her experience of studying at the School and her career steps since.
“During my undergraduate degree, I really enjoyed working with Professor Marina Resmini, who supervised me in my final year lab-based dissertation project. I was very interested in her area of research and we worked well together, so that was the deciding factor in me choosing to stay at Queen Mary for my postgraduate degree.
I really enjoyed the fact that the MSc Chemical Research programme is very lab-intensive, as I wanted to pursue a career in scientific research. I also liked being embedded within a research group, working with a diverse set of people who all shared the same desire – to contribute to a better understanding of science.
I would urge any chemistry undergraduate who is considering a PhD but is still unsure to choose this MSc as it gives you a small flavour of what life in research entails.
The MSc is particularly good at preparing students for research-based careers in both academia and industry. I would urge any chemistry undergraduate who is considering a PhD but is still unsure to choose this MSc as it gives you a small flavour of what life in research entails. It has such a research-based quality and that’s what attracted me to the programme.
For my project I worked on materials research with my supervisor Professor Resmini, looking at acrylamide based nanogels, which are polymeric in nature and have applications at the life science interface. I was characterising their behaviour in response to stimuli – specifically temperature – and how different media influenced their response to temperature. I was also studying how the chemical structure of such materials influences the overall behaviour in response to these different variables. I was proud to have my thesis work published in the Journal Polymers.
After my Masters I was keen to work in industry for a year or two. I secured a job as a Nanotechnology Scientist at Applied Nanodetectors as I thought it would be good for me to experience a more traditional work environment in addition to the experience I had working in an academic environment. There I was responsible for the research and development of metal oxide gas sensors for point-of-care medical diagnostics such as diagnostic breath analysis for asthma patients.
Now I am currently undertaking a PhD at Imperial College London where I am working on a project to develop chemical recycling techniques of plastics with the use of ionic liquids. The goal of my project is one that lies close to my heart, I have always been passionate about sustainability and want to work towards mitigating plastic pollution. I am loving the cross disciplinary nature of the programme, where chemistry, engineering and data science intersect and I’m also excited to learn python and join the data revolution!”