Jas Pal Singh Badyal (born 1964) is a

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...

in the Department of Chemistry at

Durham University Durham University (legally the University of Durham) is a collegiate university, collegiate public university, public research university in Durham, England, founded by an Act of Parliament (UK), Act of Parliament in 1832 and incorporated by r ...

. He has been Chief Scientific Adviser for Wales in the

Welsh Government The Welsh Government ( ) is the Executive (government), executive arm of the Welsh devolution, devolved government of Wales. The government consists of Cabinet secretary, cabinet secretaries and Minister of State, ministers. It is led by the F ...

since February 2023.

Education

Badyal was educated at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

where he was awarded a

Bachelor of Arts A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts deg ...

degree in

Natural Sciences Natural science or empirical science is one of the branches of science concerned with the description, understanding and prediction of natural phenomena, based on empirical evidence from observation and experimentation. Mechanisms such as peer ...

in 1985 followed by a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

in 1988 on the

surface science Surface science is the study of physical and chemical phenomena that occur at the interface of two phases, including solid–liquid interfaces, solid– gas interfaces, solid– vacuum interfaces, and liquid– gas interfaces. It includes the ...

ruthenium Ruthenium is a chemical element; it has symbol Ru and atomic number 44. It is a rare transition metal belonging to the platinum group of the periodic table. Like the other metals of the platinum group, ruthenium is unreactive to most chem ...

- titania heterogeneous catalysts.

Career and research

Following his PhD, Badyal held a

King's College, Cambridge King's College, formally The King's College of Our Lady and Saint Nicholas in Cambridge, is a List of colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college lies beside the River Cam and faces ...

research fellowship and the Cambridge University Oppenheimer Research Fellowship. He was appointed a

Lecturer Lecturer is an academic rank within many universities, though the meaning of the term varies somewhat from country to country. It generally denotes an academic expert who is hired to teach on a full- or part-time basis. They may also conduct re ...

at Durham University in 1989 and was promoted to

Full Professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a 'person who professes'. Professors ...

in 1996 where he has worked since. Badyal is internationally recognised for his pioneering research on the functionalisation of solid surfaces and deposition of functional nanolayers. Badyal has invented a wide range of novel surfaces for technological and societal applications. These have been underpinned by the investigation of fundamental mechanisms and scale-up. Examples include:

antibacterial An antibiotic is a type of antimicrobial substance active against bacteria. It is the most important type of antibacterial agent for fighting bacterial infections, and antibiotic medications are widely used in the treatment and prevention ...

, fog harvesting, catalysis, non-fouling, optochiral switches, filtration,

biochip In molecular biology, biochips are engineered substrates ("miniaturized laboratories") that can host large numbers of simultaneous biochemical reactions. One of the goals of biochip technology is to efficiently screen large numbers of biological ...

s, super-repellency, and nano-actuation.

Awards and honours

Badyal was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2016. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where: He was awarded the Royal Society of Chemistry

Edward Harrison Memorial Prize The Edward Harrison Memorial Prize was awarded from 1926 to 1979 by the Chemical Society and from 1980 to 2007 by its successor the Royal Society of Chemistry to a British chemist who was under 32 years of age, and working the fields of theoretical ...

in 1993 and Tilden Medal in 2017. In 1995, he received the C R Burch Prize, awarded by

the British Vacuum Council The British Vacuum Council (BVC) is the link between scientists and engineers within the UK and the International Union for Vacuum Science, Technique and Applications (IUVSTA). The Council supports education activities that develop the understan ...

Chief Scientific Adviser for Wales

He has been Chief Scientific Adviser for Wales in the

since February 2023.

References

External links

Jas Pal Badyal's Functional Surfaces Youtube channel
Living people Fellows of the Royal Society 1964 births Academics of Durham University {{UK-scientist-stub