Saiful Islam (born 14 August 1963) is a British

chemist A chemist (from Greek ''chēm(ía)'' alchemy; replacing ''chymist'' from Medieval Latin ''alchemist'') is a graduated scientist trained in the study of chemistry, or an officially enrolled student in the field. Chemists study the composition of ...

and professor of materials modelling at the

Department of Materials, University of Oxford The Department of Materials at the University of Oxford, England was founded in the 1950s as the ''Department of Metallurgy'', by William Hume-Rothery, who was a reader in Oxford's Department of Inorganic chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry. It is ...

. Saiful is a

Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry Fellowship of the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC) is one of the most prestigious awards conferred by the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) in the United Kingdom. Existing Fellows include award winning scientists and Nobel prize winners. FRSC awa ...

(FRSC), and received the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

Wolfson Research Merit Award The Royal Society Wolfson Fellowship, known as the Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award until 2020, is a 5 years fellowship awarded by the Royal Society since 2000. The scheme is described by the Royal Society as providing ''long-term flexib ...

and

Hughes Medal The Hughes Medal is a silver-gilt medal awarded by the Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. T ...

, and the

American Chemical Society The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a scientific society based in the United States that supports scientific inquiry in the field of chemistry. Founded in 1876 at New York University, the ACS currently has more than 155,000 members at all ...

Award for Energy Chemistry for his major contributions to the fundamental atomistic understanding of new materials for

lithium batteries Lithium battery may refer to: * Lithium metal battery, a non-rechargeable battery with lithium as an anode ** Lithium–air battery ** Lithium–iron disulfide battery ** Lithium–sulfur battery ** Nickel–lithium battery ** Rechargeable l ...

and perovskite solar cells. Saiful is an atheist who refused the

Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

citing discomfort with the phrase "

British Empire The British Empire comprised the dominions, Crown colony, colonies, protectorates, League of Nations mandate, mandates, and other Dependent territory, territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It bega ...

" and its link to colonialism.

Biography

Early life and education

Saiful was born in 1963 in

Karachi Karachi is the capital city of the Administrative units of Pakistan, province of Sindh, Pakistan. It is the List of cities in Pakistan by population, largest city in Pakistan and 12th List of largest cities, largest in the world, with a popul ...

, Pakistan to ethnically Bengali parents. The family moved to

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

in 1964 and he grew up in

Crouch End Crouch End is an area of North London, England, from the City of London in the western half of the borough of Haringey. It is within the Hornsey postal district (N8). It has been described as one of "a new breed of urban villages" in London ...

, north London. There he went to

Stationers' Company's School The Stationers' Company's School was a grammar school for boys, later a comprehensive school in Hornsey, north London. Foundation The school was founded by the Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers to provide education for sons ...

, a state comprehensive. He received both a BSc degree in chemistry and a PhD (1988) from

University College London University College London (Trade name, branded as UCL) is a Public university, public research university in London, England. It is a Member institutions of the University of London, member institution of the Federal university, federal Uni ...

, where he studied under Professor

Richard Catlow Sir Charles Richard Arthur Catlow FLSW (born 24 April 1947) is a British chemist and professor at University College London and Cardiff University. Previously, he was Director of the Davy-Faraday Research Laboratory (1998–2007), and Wolfson ...

. Subsequently, he held a postdoctoral fellowship at the

Eastman Kodak The Eastman Kodak Company, referred to simply as Kodak (), is an American public company that produces various products related to its historic basis in film photography. The company is headquartered in Rochester, New York, and is incorporated i ...

laboratories in

Rochester, New York Rochester is a city in and the county seat, seat of government of Monroe County, New York, United States. It is the List of municipalities in New York, fourth-most populous city and 10th most-populated municipality in New York, with a populati ...

, working on oxide superconductors.

Career and research

Saiful returned to the UK in 1990 to become a lecturer, then reader, at the

University of Surrey The University of Surrey is a public research university in Guildford, Surrey, England. The university received its Royal Charter, royal charter in 1966, along with a Plate glass university, number of other institutions following recommendations ...

. In January 2006 he was appointed professor of Materials Chemistry at the University of Bath. His group applies computational methods combined with structural techniques to study fundamental atomistic properties such as ion conduction, defect chemistry and surface structures. In January 2022, he joined the

as a professor of materials modelling. Saiful has been a member of the editorial board of the ''

Journal of Materials Chemistry The ''Journal of Materials Chemistry'' was a weekly peer-reviewed scientific journal covering the applications, properties and synthesis of new materials. It was established in 1991 and published by the Royal Society of Chemistry. At the end of 20 ...

'', and sits on the advisory board of the

RSC RSC may refer to: Arts * Royal Shakespeare Company, a British theatre company * Reduced Shakespeare Company, a touring American acting troupe * Richmondshire Subscription Concerts, a music society in Richmond, North Yorkshire, England * Rock Ste ...

journal ''Energy and Environmental Science''. He is Principal Investigator of the Faraday Institution's 'CATMAT' project on Next-generation Lithium-Ion Cathode Materials.

Outreach and public engagement

Saiful presented the 2016

Royal Institution Christmas Lectures The Royal Institution Christmas Lectures are a series of lectures on a single topic each, which have been held at the Royal Institution in London each year since 1825. The lectures present scientific subjects to a general audience, including yo ...

, entitled "Supercharged: Fuelling the Future" on the theme of

energy Energy () is the physical quantity, quantitative physical property, property that is transferred to a physical body, body or to a physical system, recognizable in the performance of Work (thermodynamics), work and in the form of heat and l ...

, a commemorative lecture series for the BBC which celebrated 80 years since the Christmas Lectures were first broadcast on television in 1936. The lectures were broadcast on

BBC Four BBC Four is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was launched on 2 March 2002

, and achieved over 3.5 million interactions through the BBC broadcasts and social media. Saiful was interviewed before these lectures for articles in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

''. A demonstration in these lectures led to a

Guinness World Record ''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a British reference book published annually, listi ...

for the highest voltage (1,275 Volts) produced by a fruit battery using more than 1,000 lemons. Saiful later broke that record in 2021 after using 2,923 lemons to produce 2,307.8 Volts. Saiful has served on the Diversity Committee of the

, and was selected for the Royal Society's 'Inspiring Scientists' project that recorded the life stories of British scientists with minority ethnic heritage in partnership with

National Life Stories National Life Stories (NLS) is an independent charitable trust and limited company (registered as the "National Life Story Collection") based within the British Library Oral History section, whose key focus and expertise is oral history fieldwork. ...

at the

British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. Based in London, it is one of the largest libraries in the world, with an estimated collection of between 170 and 200 million items from multiple countries. As a legal deposit li ...

. His outreach activities include talks on energy materials to student audiences using 3D glasses organised by the TTP Education in Action at the UCL Institute of Education, London. He was interviewed for

The Life Scientific ''The Life Scientific'' is a BBC Radio 4 science programme, presented by Jim Al-Khalili, in which each episode is dedicated to the biography and work of a living scientist. The programme consists of an interview between Al-Khalili and the featur ...

programme on BBC Radio 4 in October 2019. On 23 November 2022, Saiful was an invited speaker at the Brian Cox &

Robin Ince Robin Ince (born 20 February 1969) is an English comedian, actor and writer. He is known for presenting the BBC radio show '' The Infinite Monkey Cage'' with physicist Brian Cox, creating Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless People, co-creatin ...

's Compendium of Reason charity event, which was at the

Royal Albert Hall The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London, England. It has a seating capacity of 5,272. Since the hall's opening by Queen Victoria in 1871, the world's leading artists from many performance genres ...

Personal life

As of 2021, Saiful lives in Bath with his wife, Gita Sunthankar (a local GP), and their two children, Yasmin and Zak. Saiful is an

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

and Patron of

Humanists UK Humanists UK, known from 1967 until May 2017 as the British Humanist Association (BHA), is a charitable organisation which promotes secular humanism and aims to represent Irreligion in the United Kingdom, non-religious people in the UK throug ...

Awards and honours

Saiful is a

(FRSC) since 2008 and the

Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining The Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining (IOM3) is a British engineering institution with activities including promotion of the development of materials science. It has been a registered charity governed by a royal charter and a member ...

(FIMMM), as well as Honorary Fellow of the

British Science Association The British Science Association (BSA) is a charity and learned society founded in 1831 to aid in the promotion and development of science. Until 2009 it was known as the British Association for the Advancement of Science (BA). The current Chief ...

. Saiful has received several RSC research awards including 2008

Francis Bacon Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban (; 22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626) was an English philosopher and statesman who served as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England under King James I. Bacon argued for the importance of nat ...

Medal for Fuel Cell Science, 2011 Materials Chemistry Division Lecturer Award, 2013 Sustainable Energy Award, 2013

from the

, 2017 Peter Day Award for Materials Chemistry, 2020 Storch Award in Energy Chemistry from the

, 2022

from the Royal society, and the Robert Perrin Award from

. In 2019, he declined a

New Year Honours The New Year Honours is a part of the British honours system, with New Year's Day, 1 January, being marked by naming new members of orders of chivalry and recipients of other official honours. A number of other Commonwealth realms also mark this ...

Award of an

, because he is "never been comfortable with the words ‘British Empire’ in this award and the links to empire, colonialism, and slavery".

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Islam, Saiful Living people 1963 births Academics of the University of Bath Academics of the University of Surrey Alumni of University College London British atheists People from Crouch End Fellows of the Royal Society of Chemistry British humanists British computational chemists 20th-century British chemists 21st-century British chemists British people of Bangladeshi descent Solid state chemists Fellows of St Anne's College, Oxford Fellows of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining Statutory Professors of the University of Oxford