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School of Physical and Chemical Sciences

China Scholarship Council Project

Queen Mary University of London has partnered with the China Scholarship Council (CSC) to offer a joint scholarship programme to enable Chinese students to study for a PhD programme at Queen Mary. Under the scheme, Queen Mary will provide scholarships to cover all tuition fees, whilst the CSC will provide living expenses for 4 years and one return flight ticket to successful applicants. 

The School of Physical and Chemical Sciences is pleased to offer several projects under this scheme to start in September 2025. Please see below for the available projects.

Eligibility and applying

Applicants must be:

  • Chinese students with a strong academic background.
  • Students holding a PR Chinese passport.
  • Either a resident in China at the time of application or studying overseas. 
  • Students with prior experience of studying overseas (including in the UK) are eligible to apply. Chinese QMUL graduates/Masters’ students are therefore eligible for the scheme.

Please refer to the CSC website for full details on eligibility and conditions on the scholarship.

The deadline for applications to Queen Mary is 31st January 2025. Applicants will need to complete an online application form by this date to be considered. Shortlisted applicants will be invited for a formal interview by the project supervisor. Those who are successful in their application for our PhD programme will be issued with an offer letter which is conditional on securing a CSC scholarship (as well as any academic conditions still required to meet our entry requirements).

Once applicants have obtained their offer letter from Queen Mary they should then apply to CSC for the scholarship by the advertised deadline with the support of the project supervisor.  Please note that we expect all applicants to have satisfied Queen Mary's English language requirement at the time of their application to CSC.  

For September 2025 entry, applicants must complete the CSC application on the CSC website by the advertised deadline.

Only applicants who are successful in their application to CSC can be issued an unconditional offer and enrol on our PhD programme.

Projects:

 

Project Title Supervisor
Observational cosmology with upcoming surveys (China Scholarship Council project) Professor Chris Clarkson
Searching for ultra-high energy neutrinos in Antarctica (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Linda Cremonesi
Quantum Coherent Phenomena in Molecular Nanomagnets (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Junjie Liu
Machine learning developments for particle physics discoveries (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Marcella Bona
Molecular memristors for next-generation computing (China Scholarship Council project) Professor Jan Mol
New techniques for scattering amplitudes of particles and strings (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Ricardo Monteiro
Development of new electrolytes for all-solid-state battery systems(China Scholarship Council project) Dr Isaac Abrahams
Minimizing exciton and charge losses in next generation organic solar cell materials with extremely weak vibronic coupling, a single molecule approach (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Stoichko Dimitrov
Helicenes and Chiral Spin Filtering (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Jochen Brandt
Helicenes and Chiral Spin Filtering (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Jochen Brandt
Computational Catalyst Design for Value-Added Molecule Conversion (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Devis Di Tommaso
Photocatalysis with Soft Semiconductors (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Stoichko Dimitrov
From data to discovery: development of a comprehensive bioinformatic toolkit for myosin studies (China Scholarship Council project) Dr Arianna Fornili
Large scale structure in the Universe (China Scholarship Council project) Professor Chris Clarkson

Research Group: Chemistry
Number of Students: 1
Length of Study in Years: 4 Years
Full-time Project: yes

Funding

 

Funding is provided via the China Scholarship Council.  

    • Available to Chinese applicants only.
    • Applicant required to start in September 2025.
    • The studentship arrangement will cover overseas tuition fees for the duration of the studentship.

Project Description

 The introduction of chirality into conjugated organic semiconductors can result in more sustainable electronic devices, such as more efficient OLED screens for smartphones or TVs, and bring new functionality to emerging technologies. An extraordinary recent discovery in chiral materials research has been the observation of the Chiral Induced Spin Selectivity (CISS) effect: spin-selective charge transport through chiral molecules. The spin control exhibited by chiral molecules could lead to the enhanced hydrogen production in water splitting and faster, more efficient devices, by enabling the combination of spin and charge (spintronics) in computer processors. However, the full technological potential of the CISS effect has yet to be realised, partly due to our limited understanding of the effect. I propose to untangle the different contributions to CISS for the first time by measuring how systematic variations of an electron’s chiral and spin environment impact a material’s spin filtering properties.

There are two possible projects and the successful candidate may decide to pursue either one of these or a combination of both. The projects are: 1) a synthetic organic project to develop the first general enantioselective synthesis of compounds called helicenes that possess a helically chiral – yet fully aromatic – backbone. This project will employ transition metal catalysis and provide training in reaction optimisation and methodology development. Project 2) is a highly interdisciplinary project to synthesise helicenes and use them to investigate the CISS effect. The helicenes will be prepared using a photochemical flow synthesis currently being developed by the Brandt group (DOI 10.26434/chemrxiv-2024-cgnhq ). While traditional, batch-based photochemical reactions can be difficult to scale, our preliminary results have shown robust helicene yields up to 9.8 mmol (79% yield). The synthesised materials will then be characterised in solution and the solid-state using advanced characterisation techniques that probe the photophysical and electronic properties (e.g. spin filtering, UV/vis, (magnetic) circular dichroism, cyclic voltammetry). The ideal candidate should have some experience in synthetic chemistry and be interested in exploring a highly interdisciplinary, collaborative, and dynamic field of scientific research.

 

Requirements

Application Method:

To apply for this studentship and for entry on to the Chemistry programme (Full Time) please follow the instructions detailed on the following webpage:

https://www.qmul.ac.uk/spcs/phdresearch/application-process/#apply

Supervisor Contact Details:

For informal enquiries about this position, please contact Dr Jochen Brandt

E-mail: j.brandt@qmul.ac.uk

Application Method:

To apply for this studentship and for entry on to the PhD programme (Full Time) please follow the instructions detailed on the following webpage:

https://www.qmul.ac.uk/postgraduate/research/subjects/chemistry.html

Further Guidance: http://www.qmul.ac.uk/postgraduate/research/

Deadline for applications: 31st of January 2025

SPCS Academics: Dr Jochen Brandt