Patrick Robertson
Assistant Professor of Physical Chemistry, Faculty of Science
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Biography
I received my Bachelor of Science degree in chemistry from the University of Western Australia, before completing postgraduate qualifications at the University of Melbourne. I was awarded a PhD from La Trobe University, in Melbourne, Australia in 2018 for studies of flexible biomolecules and solvated clusters using electronic and infrared double resonance laser spectroscopy. After PhD, I was a postdoc at the University of Bristol working for Professor Andrew Orr-Ewing FRS. I studied bimolecular reaction dynamics in the gas-phase using velocity-map imaging & ultrafast chemical dynamics in solution using transient absorption spectroscopy.
In April 2021, I joined Prof Claire Vallance's research group at the University of Oxford where I studied chemical dynamics of electron and photo-induced processes using multi-mass ion imaging and covariance mapping techniques. During this appointment, I taught physical chemistry at Hertford College, across a broad range of topics including quantum mechanics, spectroscopy, statistical mechanics and reaction kinetics.
In June 2024, I began my independent career at the University of Nottingham, where I leads the Nottingham Ultrafast Reaction Dynamics (NURD) Lab (www.nurd.org.uk), where we conduct research into the ultrafast chemistry of molecules and ions in the gas-phase.
Expertise Summary
Physical chemistry, chemical physics, chemical dynamics, spectroscopy, ultrafast processes
Teaching Summary
I currently teach a 10 lecture course in 3rd year physical chemistry (CHEM3064) on reaction rate theory and statistical mechanics.
My group is going to be taking on MSci project students as of the 2025 academic year, so stay tuned for projects.
Research Summary
We are currently developing new tools to study photo- and electron-induced chemical reactions on the ultrafast timescale. We use time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy and ion imaging to study the… read more
Working with us will give you hands-on experience in any or all of, lasers, optics, high-vacuum instrumentation, method development, scientific programming in python, quantum chemical calculations, science communication and an introduction to an international network of physical chemistry and chemical physicists. If you're interested in getting involved at any level of study, please do get in touch, we'd love to hear from you.
At this stage, the group will be taking on students in the 2025/26 academic year. We will be advertising PhD position(s) and will have MSci projects available very soon.
Current Research
We are currently developing new tools to study photo- and electron-induced chemical reactions on the ultrafast timescale. We use time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy and ion imaging to study the excited-state dynamics in flexible molecules and their clusters with one or several water molecules.
We also study the chemistry of molecular ions using mass spectrometry, learning how large molecules dissociate upon ionisation.
Lastly, our group collaborates with other teams from around the world to conduct experiments at X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL) facilities, where we are trying to record "molecular movies" of chemical reactions has they happen. These large-scale efforts are at the very cutting edge of physics and chemistry, and bring together experts in many areas of chemical physics to handle to experimental, and data analysis challenges that arise in such sophisticated experiments.
Future Research
Our work into the ultrafast dynamics of ions will be a major focus going forward, as the chemistry of ions are poorly understood on this timescale. This work will be part of a collaborative project between our group in Nottingham and QUANTEMOL, a plasma modelling company based out of UCL.