Zoe Pikramenou

Last updated

Zoe Pikramenou
Alma mater National and Kapodistrian University of Athens B.Sc. (1987)
Michigan State University Ph.D. (1993)
Scientific career
Fields Nanotechnology Inorganic chemistry Photophysics
Institutions University of Birmingham
Doctoral advisor Daniel G. Nocera
Other academic advisors Jean Marie Lehn
Website www.birmingham.ac.uk/staff/profiles/chemistry/pikramenou-zoe.aspx

Zoe Pikramenou is Professor of Inorganic Chemistry and Photophysics at the University of Birmingham, where she is the first female professor in the chemistry department. [1]

Contents

Education and career

Pikramenou graduated in 1987 with a B.Sc. in Chemistry from the University of Athens in Greece. She then moved to Michigan State University where she worked in the lab of Daniel G. Nocera, graduating with a Ph.D. in Chemistry in 1993. [2] She then conducted post-doctoral studies at University of Strasbourg in France as a Marie Curie and Collège de France fellow working with Nobel prize-winner Jean-Marie Lehn. [2] She became a lecturer at the University of Edinburgh in 1995, then was appointed to the University of Birmingham in 2000. [2]

Research

Platelet actin nodules are podosome-like structures.

Pikramenou is a inorganic chemist with experience in nanotechnology and photophysics, who has researched lanthanide luminescent complexes.[ citation needed ] Recent research has investigated how gold nanorods could be applied to treat cancerous cells in the body. [3] This research is in partnership with the Canadian company Sona Nanotech Inc. [4] Pikramenou has researched other applications of gold nanoparticles, including their use in tracking blood flow in capillary networks. [5] She was part of a team that developed iridium-coated gold nanoparticles, significant because they have a longer lifetime of use. [6] She has co-investigated platelet nodules, using microscopy. [7]

Another medical application of Pikramenou's nanoparticle research includes the application of coated silica particles to treat sensitive teeth. [8] As part of her doctoral research at Michigan State University, Pikramenou invented a nanoparticle bucket, which lights up when in contains a particular compound. [9] This kind of microscopic bucket is described as a supramolecule. [9]

Coated nanoparticles patent

In 2017, Pikramenou and her co-researcher Nicola J Rogers, were granted a patent to protect their invention of a new process of combining at least one metal complex and a surfactant. [10]

Awards

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nanoparticle</span> Particle with size less than 100 nm

A nanoparticle or ultrafine particle is a particle of matter 1 to 100 nanometres (nm) in diameter. The term is sometimes used for larger particles, up to 500 nm, or fibers and tubes that are less than 100 nm in only two directions. At the lowest range, metal particles smaller than 1 nm are usually called atom clusters instead.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nanochemistry</span> Combination of chemistry and nanoscience

Nanochemistry is an emerging sub-discipline of the chemical and material sciences that deals with the development of new methods for creating nanoscale materials. The term "nanochemistry" was first used by Ozin in 1992 as 'the uses of chemical synthesis to reproducibly afford nanomaterials from the atom "up", contrary to the nanoengineering and nanophysics approach that operates from the bulk "down"'. Nanochemistry focuses on solid-state chemistry that emphasizes synthesis of building blocks that are dependent on size, surface, shape, and defect properties, rather than the actual production of matter. Atomic and molecular properties mainly deal with the degrees of freedom of atoms in the periodic table. However, nanochemistry introduced other degrees of freedom that controls material's behaviors by transformation into solutions. Nanoscale objects exhibit novel material properties, largely as a consequence of their finite small size. Several chemical modifications on nanometer-scaled structures approve size dependent effects.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leroy Cronin</span> British chemist

Leroy "Lee" CroninFRSE FRSC is the Regius Chair of Chemistry in the School of Chemistry at the University of Glasgow. He was elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, the Royal Society of Chemistry, and appointed to the Regius Chair of Chemistry in 2013. He was previously the Gardiner Chair, appointed April 2009.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thalappil Pradeep</span> Indian scientist

Thalappil Pradeep is an institute professor and professor of chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras. He is also the Deepak Parekh Chair Professor. In 2020 he received the Padma Shri award for his distinguished work in the field of Science and Technology. He has received the Nikkei Asia Prize (2020), The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS) prize (2018), and the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology in 2008 by Council of Scientific and Industrial Research.

Magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) are a class of nanoparticle that can be manipulated using magnetic fields. Such particles commonly consist of two components, a magnetic material, often iron, nickel and cobalt, and a chemical component that has functionality. While nanoparticles are smaller than 1 micrometer in diameter, the larger microbeads are 0.5–500 micrometer in diameter. Magnetic nanoparticle clusters that are composed of a number of individual magnetic nanoparticles are known as magnetic nanobeads with a diameter of 50–200 nanometers. Magnetic nanoparticle clusters are a basis for their further magnetic assembly into magnetic nanochains. The magnetic nanoparticles have been the focus of much research recently because they possess attractive properties which could see potential use in catalysis including nanomaterial-based catalysts, biomedicine and tissue specific targeting, magnetically tunable colloidal photonic crystals, microfluidics, magnetic resonance imaging, magnetic particle imaging, data storage, environmental remediation, nanofluids, optical filters, defect sensor, magnetic cooling and cation sensors.

Multiple layered plasmonics use electronically responsive media to change and manipulate the plasmonic properties of plasmons. The properties typically being manipulated can include the directed scattering of light and light absorption. The use of these to use “changeable” plasmonics is currently undergoing development in the academic community by allowing them to have multiple sets of functions that are dependent on how they are being manipulated or excited. Under these new manipulations, such as multiple layers that respond to different resonant frequencies, their new functions were designed to accomplish multiple objectives in a single application.

Martin Schröder in an inorganic chemist. He is Vice President and Dean for the Faculty of Science and Engineering and Professor of Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Manchester since June 2015. He served previously as Executive Dean of the Faculty of Science from 2011 to 2015 and Professor of Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Nottingham from 1995 to 2015.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Polly Arnold</span> British chemist

Polly Louise Arnold is director of the chemical sciences division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and professor of chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley. She previously held the Crum Brown chair in the School of Chemistry, University of Edinburgh from 2007 to 2019 and an Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) career fellowship.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christy Haynes</span> American analytical chemist

Christy Lynn Haynes is a chemist at the University of Minnesota. She works at the interface of analytical, biological, and nanomaterials chemistry.

Rachel O'Reilly is a British chemist and Professor at the University of Birmingham. She works at the interface of biology and materials, creating polymers that can mimic natural nanomaterials such as viruses and cells. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and of the Royal Society.

John S. Fossey was a British chemist. He was a professor of synthetic chemistry at the University of Birmingham in the United Kingdom, and a visiting professor at Henan Normal University and guest professor at East China University of Science and Technology, both in China. His research was in molecular recognition and catalysis, and he was a user of boronic acid derivatives. He was a former industry fellow of the Royal Society.

Fiona C. Meldrum is a British scientist who is a Professor of Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Leeds where she works on bio-inspired materials and crystallisation processes. She won the 2017 Royal Society of Chemistry Interdisciplinary Prize.

Sherine O. Obare is the dean of the Joint School of Nanoscience and Nanoengineering at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. She works on nanomaterials for sensing and drug delivery.

Rebecca Jane Lunn is a Professor and Head of the Centre for Ground Engineering and Energy Geosciences at the University of Strathclyde. I

Karen Jane Faulds is a Scottish academic and Professor of Analytical Chemistry at the University of Strathclyde. She develops surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) for bioanalysis, and has won several awards for her research, including the Coblentz Society Craver Award.

King Kuok "Mimi" Hii is a chemist whose fields of research include application of catalysis to organic synthesis. She is the Director of Imperial College London's Centre for Rapid Online Analysis of Reactions (ROAR).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nguyen TK Thanh</span> Vietnamese nanotechnologist

Nguyễn Thị Kim Thanh is a professor of Nanomaterials at University College London. She was awarded the 2019 Royal Society Rosalind Franklin Award for her research and efforts toward gender equality.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elena Besley</span> Computational chemist, researcher

Elena Besley is a British scientist who is Professor of Theoretical and Computational Chemistry at the University of Nottingham. She holds a Royal Society Wolfson Fellowship and is Associate Editor of Nano Letters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Iseult Lynch</span> Irish chemist and Professor

Iseult Lynch is an Irish chemist and Professor of Enivornmental Nanoscience at the School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Birmingham. Her research focuses on the safety of nanoparticles in the environment and their interactions with biological entities.

Emilie Ringe is an American chemist who is an assistant professor at the University of Cambridge. She was selected by Chemical & Engineering News as one of its "Talented Twelve" young scientists in 2021.

References

  1. "Student-led careers event focuses on women in science". www.iop.org. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  2. 1 2 3 "Dr Zoe Pikramenou, Chemistry - University of Birmingham". www.birmingham.ac.uk. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  3. "Nano-tech experts begin cancer research". BusinessCloud.co.uk. 14 May 2019. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  4. "Birmingham and Canadian nano-tech experts begin advanced cancer research – Birmingham Health Partners". www.birminghamhealthpartners.co.uk. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  5. "Gold 'nanoprobes' used to track blood flow in tiny vessels". phys.org. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  6. King, Siobhan M.; Claire, Sunil; Teixeira, Rodolfo I.; Dosumu, Abiola N.; Carrod, Andrew J.; Dehghani, Hamid; Hannon, Michael J.; Ward, Andrew D.; Bicknell, Roy; Botchway, Stanley W.; Hodges, Nikolas J. (15 August 2018). "Iridium Nanoparticles for Multichannel Luminescence Lifetime Imaging, Mapping Localization in Live Cancer Cells". Journal of the American Chemical Society. 140 (32): 10242–10249. doi: 10.1021/jacs.8b05105 . ISSN   0002-7863. PMID   30032598.
  7. Poulter, Natalie S.; Pollitt, Alice Y.; Davies, Amy; Malinova, Dessislava; Nash, Gerard B.; Hannon, Mike J.; Pikramenou, Zoe; Rappoport, Joshua Z.; Hartwig, John H.; Owen, Dylan M.; Thrasher, Adrian J. (2015). "Platelet actin nodules are podosome-like structures dependent on Wiskott–Aldrich syndrome protein and ARP2/3 complex". Nature Communications. 6 (1): 7254. Bibcode:2015NatCo...6.7254P. doi:10.1038/ncomms8254. ISSN   2041-1723. PMC   4458878 . PMID   26028144.
  8. "Tiny silica particles could be used to repair damaged teeth, research shows". ScienceDaily. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  9. 1 2 Nocera, Dan (1996). "Not Just a Pretty Shape". institutions.newscientist.com. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  10. US 9683004,Pikramenou, Zoe&Rogers, Nicola,"Coated nanoparticles",published 2017-06-20, assigned to University of Birmingham & inventors.
  11. "Research Fellowships 2012 | The Leverhulme Trust". www.leverhulme.ac.uk. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  12. EPSRC. "Grants on the web". gow.epsrc.ukri.org. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  13. "- University of Birmingham research gateway". research.birmingham.ac.uk. Retrieved 18 January 2020.