Case Scientific Information

Fiona's technical expertise is soft matter (or soft nanotechnology): in industrial polymer and surfactant science, and the industrial application of computational chemistry, molecular modeling and property prediction. She works as a lecturer and consultant for the Nano Science and Technology Institute , and is also a feature writer for Chemistry World. Her introduction to industrial polymer science was in the late 80s at Courtaulds Research in the UK where she worked as part of the team developing Tencel - a new environmentally friendly solvent spun cellulose fiber. She also investigated the effects of polyacrylonitrile microstructure on carbon fiber performance using computer modeling techniques. Courtaulds' involvement as a founder member of the Biosym/Molecular Simulations Inc. (MSI) Polymer Consortium , one of the earliest materials modeling efforts, meant frequent trips to sunny San Diego, CA. In 1991 she moved to California to join Biosym. Fiona spent nine years at Biosym/MSI (now Accelrys ). She carried out contract research for some of the top US and European materials science companies to demonstrate the value of molecular modeling for their specific applications. As manager of the MSI materials modeling training group she prepared and presented workshops worldwide on molecular modeling of materials and polymers. She also worked in marketing and technical sales support. In 1999 she was hired into a central research group at Colgate Palmolive . This presented challenges including materials structure and property prediction for toothpaste, detergent, hard surface care and personal care products, and packaging and fragrance technology. While at Colgate she organized a symposium on Mesoscale Phenomena in Fluid Systems on behalf of the American Chemical Society, Division of Physical Chemistry, which was held during the ACS National Meeting in Boston, 2002. She is the coeditor of a book based on this symposium (ACS Symposium Series #861). In 2003 Fiona left Colgate Palmolive to move to beautiful Vermont ...