Williams, Nick H. - University of Sheffield

个人简介

Prof. Williams obtained his BA in Chemistry from Cambridge in 1988, which was followed by an MA and PhD from the same institution in 1992. After his PhD he was a post doctoral fellow and temporary lector at Trinity College, Cambridge. In 1994 he became a RS/NSERC Research Fellow at McGill University in Montréal. In 1996 he was appointed to a lectureship at the University of Sheffield, where he was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2003 and then Reader in 2007. In 20011 he was promoted to Professor.

研究领域

Our research can be broadly described as physical organic chemistry. This is the design, synthesis and systematic study of (mainly) organic molecules. The molecules we are interested in designing are ones which either show fundamental insights into mechanisms, reactivity, recognition and/or catalysis, or exploit the understanding we have to create more complex supramolecular systems. Practically, we think at the molecular level (designing organic molecules with key structural features), make them (organic synthesis), and finally discover how well they function by carefully examining their properties. Currently, we have three main strands of investigation: Enzymes are remarkably efficient catalysts, operating under mild aqueous conditions; as man made efforts to achieve similar activity are many orders of magnitude less efficient, there is still a great deal that we do not understand. We are investigating well defined model compounds to understand how to combine several functional groups so that they work really effectively together. This helps give a deeper understanding of biological catalysis, and guides us in designing our own biomimetic catalysts. Organic ligands which can bind and control the reactivity of metal ions provide the best catalysts to date, and form the core of our models and catalysts. We are applying the discovery that individual components of a catalyst can be brought together to achieve cooperative catalysis (i.e. the whole is more effective than the sum of the parts!) towards creating supramolecular systems which can be controlled by recognition processes. This is the type of event which takes place in signalling at cell surfaces, and we are making transmembrane signalling systems which mimic this.

近期论文

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Kirwa A, Williams NH, Mulla MY, Di Natale C, Paolesse R & Grell M (2017) 'Rough guide' evanescent wave optrode for colorimetric metalloporphyrine sensors. Talanta, 164, 228-232. View this article in WRRO Williams NH, Duarte F, Barrozo A, Aqvist J & Kamerlin SCL (2016) The Competing Mechanisms of Phosphate Monoester Dianion Hydrolysis. Journal of the American Chemical Society. View this article in WRRO Grell M, Williams N & Tuwei KA (2016) Fibre optic absorbance meter with low limit of detection for waterborne cations. Sensors & Actuators: B. Chemical, 237, 1102-1107. View this article in WRRO Alfhaid L, Seddon WD, Williams NH & Geoghegan M (2016) Double-network hydrogels improve pH-switchable adhesion. Soft Matter, 12, 5022-5028. View this article in WRRO Li D & Williams NH (2016) The solvolysis mechanism of simple secondary tosylates in 50% aqueous TFE. Journal of Physical Organic Chemistry. View this article in WRRO Cullen W, Misuraca MC, Hunter CA, Williams NH & Ward MD (2016) Highly efficient catalysis of the Kemp elimination in the cavity of a cubic coordination cage. Nature Chemistry, 8(3), 231-236. View this article in WRRO Tirel EY & Williams NH (2015) Enhancing phosphate diester cleavage by a zinc complex through controlling nucleophile coordination. Chemistry - A European Journal, 21(19), 7053-7056. View this article in WRRO