UCL academics honoured by the Royal Society of Chemistry

Professor Beale, Professor Thanh, Dr Stamatakis - Professor Nguyen T. K. Thanh (UCL Physics & Astronomy), Professor Andrew Beale (UCL Chemistry) and Dr Michail Stamatakis (UCL Chemical Engineering) have been awarded prizes from the Royal Society of Chemistry in recognition of their outstanding research achievements. Professor Thanh was named winner of the Interdisciplinary Prize, recognising her brilliance in research and innovation - specifically, for her contributions to our fundamental understanding of chemical syntheses and her physical studies of nanomaterials, which could be used to help with diagnosis and treatment of cancer as well as other biomedical applications. Her research using magnetic nanoparticles to deliver chemotherapy, demonstrated using cells in the lab, may help to improve cancer treatment. She is also investigating a replacement for gadolinium, a contrast agent used for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) that cannot be used in people with kidney failure and whose use has the potential to contaminate water supplies. Professor Thanh said: "I am very happy - it is a great honour to have my collaborative research to be recognised. This prize is for my team and my collaborators as well." Professor Beale was named winner of the Peter Day Award for developing new ways of using bright light sources to identify active species in catalysis and energy storage.