Draft Programme

---

Plenary Speakers

Sian Fussell is the Chief Technology Officer at Albotherm, a company she co-founded in 2020. She leads the development of Albotherm’s smart coating technology, driving innovation to support the global transition to net zero.
Before Albotherm, Sian completed a PhD at the University of Bristol, where she discovered the core technology that underpins the company’s innovations. She has expertise in materials science, sustainability, and translating cutting-edge research into commercial applications.

Dr Arwen Tyler studied Chemistry with Medicinal Chemistry (specialising in physical chemistry) at Imperial College London. She then studied for an integrated MRes/ PhD at the Chemical Biology Centre in the Membrane Biophysics Group at Imperial focussing on the structure and dynamics of lipid lyotropic liquid crystalline phases using high hydrostatic pressure. In 2012, she was the awarded an EPSRC Doctoral Prize Fellowship to develop lipid drug delivery vehicles. After a few postdoc positions she joined the University of Leeds as a tenure-track University Academic Fellow in 2016 and promoted to Associate Professor in 2021. The group is interested in the fundamental understanding of the self-assembly of lipids and their interactions with biomolecules for various biomedical and biotechnological applications.

---

Local Organisers

Dr Matt Derry studied Chemistry with a Year in Industry at the University of York and obtained his MChem degree in 2012. This was followed by an industry funded PhD in polymer chemistry at the University of Sheffield, where he used polymer synthesis and self-assembly techniques to develop new additives for automotive oil. He then continued at the University of Sheffield as a Research Associate to study block copolymer self-assembly using synchrotron X-ray scattering techniques. In 2019, Matt joined Aston University as a Lecturer in Chemistry and was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2024. He is a co-founder of the newly established Aston Institute for Membrane Excellence (AIME) and leads a team of PhD and postdoctoral researchers who are developing new polymer materials for a range of applications including energy storage, data storage and water filtration.

---

Dr Sam Wilson-Whitford completed an MChem in Chemistry with Professional Experience at the University of Warwick, where he stayed to complete a PhD in Polymer and Colloidal Chemistry (2019) in the group of Prof. dr. ir. Stefan Bon. His project focused on the use of supramolecular polymeric drag reducers for fluid transport. After his PhD, Sam worked as a Research Associate at the University of Warwick, in collaboration with Unilever, before taking a postdoctoral fellowship with Prof. James Gilchrist, in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Lehigh University, PA, USA, where he worked on magnetically responsive colloidal suspensions for optically dynamic coatings and microrobotics applications. Since 2024, Sam has been a Tenure-Track Research Fellow at the Aston Institute for Membrane Excellence (AIME) where his research focus is split between colloidal interactions at biological membranes and responsive granular microrobotics.

---

Sponsors

Should you wish to exhibit at and sponsor ECCo 2025 please contact team@eccolloid.co.uk

---