Research Associate, Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge

Dr Chris Forman joined the Institute for Manufacturing in July 2009 as a Research Associate after completing his PhD at the Department of Chemistry in the University of Cambridge. He is currently developing software to connect advanced statistical physics techniques, basin hopping and dynamical simulations to simplify the design of protein based materials; designing, making and characterising amyloid fibres with specific morphologies; and investigating the effects of entropy on the structure of collagen..

Dr Forman studied theoretical physics at Edinburgh University from 1995 to 1999, moving into commercial/defence satellite communications and atmospheric propagation. He then changed fields into nanotechnology, undertaking a Masters degree in 2004, which introduced him to bionanotechnology. He then studied from 2005 to 2009 for a PhD in biophysics under Paul Barker to learn more about the components that biology uses.

In his first Post-Doc at the Institute for Manufacturing, under Prof Bill O'Neill, Dr Forman explored the use of Focussed Ion Beam to control the potential and topology of HOPG surfaces, as a means of tuning electrodes for biological interactions, and this work is ongoing. In his second Post-Doc at the Department of Chemistry, under Prof David Wales, he has been using coarse grain basin hopping techniques to study bone and peptide based fibrous materials, in collaboration with Prof Melinda Duer and Dr Paul Barker.