Overview
Functional Electronic Materials
My interests are in functional electronic materials, that is, materials that have interesting - and sometimes useful - characteristics, such as magnetism or superconductivity.
Often, their properties are not ideal, or their performance is insufficient for viable applications.
Targetted experimental research may then be able improve a given material, or lead towards an entirely new and better material.
I retain an interest in high temperature superconductors, with new families of compounds that have been discovered recently ( Superconductivity and the new Fe Based Superconductors.pdf ).
In an ongoing collaboration with colleagues in New Zealand, I am looking at some potential applications of these materials ( http://www.irl.cri.nz/our-research/high-tech-manufacturing/high-temperature-superconductors ).
An entirely different group of materials have a specific magnetic property: when a magnetic field is applied to them, they change temperature. Some new materials are close to being useful for magnetic refrigeration, and so may bring about more efficient use of energy for cooling ( http://workspace.imperial.ac.uk/experimentalsolidstate/public/Magnetocalorics-KGS-LFC web.pdf )