I currently work as data scientist at Merck in the US. Previously, I did a PhD with Alexei Lapkin on applying machine learning to chemical problems, as a Marshall Scholar funded by a Cambridge-Trust Marshall Scholarship. My PhD was also associated with the Syntech CDT and BASF.
For years, I have wanted to combine computers and chemical engineering. During my undergrad at NC State, I got my first taste of computational chemistry during a Research Experience for Undergraduates in South Dakota. I applied molecular dynamics (MD) to predict properties of advanced materials. Hilariously, I misspelled conclusions on my first research paper and had to print a label to go on top.
After a stint at Eastman Chemical also doing MD, I started working on flow chemistry with Prof. Milad Abolhasani at NC State. We built a robot that can run thousands of perovskite reactions per day. We have a pending patent and several publications on this work. This research experience changed my direction and was the reason I chose to move to the UK.
During my time at the University of Cambridge, I worked on using optimization to quickly find the optimal conditions for chemical reactions. I created Summit, an open-source python library designed for reaction optimization. I also work on accelerating development of control systems for distillation columns. Check out my publications to see more.
