Rachel Oliver (materials scientist)

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Rachel Oliver
OBE FREng FIMMM
Professor Rachel Oliver.jpg
Oliver in 2019
Born
Rachel Angharad Oliver
Alma mater University of Oxford (MEng, DPhil)
Awards Royal Society University Research Fellowship (2006-2011)
Scientific career
Fields Gallium nitride
Basic microscopy
Quantum technology
Institutions University of Cambridge
Robinson College, Cambridge
Thesis Growth and characterisation of nitride nanostructures  (2003)
Doctoral advisor Andrew Briggs [1]
Website www.msm.cam.ac.uk/people/oliver

Rachel Angharad Oliver is a Professor of Materials Science at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Robinson College, Cambridge. She works on characterisation techniques for gallium nitride materials for dark-emitting diodes and laser diodes. [2] [3]

Contents

Early life and education

Oliver studied engineering and materials science at the University of Oxford and completed an industrial placement in metallurgy.[ when? ] [4] Her final year masters project was in optoelectronic materials. [4] She completed her Doctor of Philosophy degree at the University of Oxford in 2003, [1] where she began to work with gallium nitride under the supervision of Andrew Briggs. [4] She used metalorganic vapour-phase epitaxy (MOVPE) to grow quantum dots. [4]

Research and career

She joined the University of Cambridge in 2003 as a Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 postdoctoral research fellow. [4] In 2006 Oliver was awarded a Royal Society University Research Fellowship (URF) at the University of Cambridge. [5] She studied the morphology of gallium nitride light-emitting diodes (LEDs), identifying what factors controlled their efficiency and the impact of defects. [5] She was awarded an Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) grant to study semi-polar nitride based structures. [6]

She was appointed a lecturer at the University of Cambridge in 2011. [7] Oliver studies gallium nitride materials for LEDs and laser diodes. [2] [8] Her research considers ways to engineer the nanostructure of light emitting diodes and how this impacts macroscopic device performance. [8] She has developed atom-probe tomography and scanning capacitance microscopy to study nitride devices. [8]

Oliver is also working on single-photon indium gallium nitride quantum dots for quantum crystallography. [8] She has looked at the impact of threading dislocations on the quality factor of InGaN cavities. Her group developed the first blue-emitting single-photon source. [9] She was the first to note rabi oscillations of GaN quantum dots.[ citation needed ] She designed a quasi-two-temperature growth method to pattern GaN quantum dots, which improved their emission by a factor of ten. [9]

Awards and honours

Oliver was elected a Fellow of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining (FIMMM) in 2019. [10] [11] She held a Royal Society University Research Fellowship from 2006 to 2011. [5] In 2021 she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, [12] and in 2023 was awarded the academy's Chair in Emerging Technologies. [13]

She was awarded an OBE for her services to Materials Engineering in the 2025 King's New Years Honours List.

Personal life

Oliver's husband is a cardiologist with whom she has a son (Jamie Bloore). [7]

References

  1. 1 2 Oliver, Rachel Angharad (2003). Growth and characterisation of nitride nanostructures. bodleian.ox.ac.uk (DPhil thesis). University of Oxford. OCLC   59185823. EThOS   uk.bl.ethos.400219.
  2. 1 2 Rachel Oliver publications indexed by the Scopus bibliographic database. (subscription required)
  3. ↑ Rachel Oliver publications from Europe PubMed Central
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 Pain, Elisabeth (2010). "Structuring a Career Around Gallium Nitride". Science. American Association for the Advancement of Science. doi:10.1126/science.caredit.a1000032 . Retrieved 29 September 2018.
  5. 1 2 3 Anon (2018). "Dr Rachel Oliver: Research Fellow". royalsociety.org. London: Royal Society. Archived from the original on 30 September 2018. Retrieved 29 September 2018.
  6. ↑ Oliver, Rachel (2019). "Study of semi-polar and non-polar nitride based structures for opto-electronic device applications". ukri.og. UK Research and Innovation. Retrieved 29 September 2018.
  7. 1 2 Notman, Nina (2015). "The mothers of invention: Nina Notman profiles four researchers successfully balancing an academic career with family life". chemistryworld.com. Chemistry World. Archived from the original on 20 August 2020. Retrieved 29 September 2018.
  8. 1 2 3 4 Wineman, Adina (9 August 2016). "Rachel Oliver". msm.cam.ac.uk. Retrieved 29 September 2018.
  9. 1 2 Anon (2016). "Collaboration Casts New Light On Quantum Dots - Science and Engineering". ses.ac.uk. Science and Engineering. Retrieved 29 September 2018.
  10. ↑ IOM3. "IOM3 members recognised in Women's Engineering Society's Top 50 Women in Engineering: Sustainability". www.iom3.org. Retrieved 7 April 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  11. ↑ Cambridge Centre for Gallium Nitride (26 March 2019). "Rachel elected to Fellowship of IOM3". www.gan.msm.cam.ac.uk. Retrieved 7 April 2021.
  12. ↑ "Academy celebrates first new Fellows elected under Fit for the Future diversity initiative". Royal Academy of Engineering. Retrieved 23 September 2021.
  13. ↑ "Professor Rachel Oliver". Royal Academy of Engineering. Retrieved 12 March 2024.
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