Professor Emma Kendrick CChem FRSC

Winner: 2021 Environment, Sustainability and Energy Division mid-career Award

University of Birmingham

For discoveries and innovation in materials, manufacturing and recycling of lithium- and sodium-ion batteries.

Celebrate Professor Emma Kendrick

#RSCPrizes

One of my highlights was being able to publish a paper with my father, a computational chemist, in Nature Materials.

Professor Kendrick's research interest is in creating sustainable batteries: investigating the materials, manufacturability and recyclability of batteries.

Read winner biography

Professor Emma Kendrick has been Chair of Energy Materials in the School of Metallurgy and Materials, at the University of Birmingham since 2018. She also leads the Energy Materials Group at the university which does research into sustainable battery technologies.

Prior to joining the university, Professor Kendrick spent two years as Reader at WMG, University of Warwick. Her ten years of industry experience includes Sharp Labs of Europe, where she was Chief Technologist in energy storage, and two start-up companies (Surion Energy and Fife Batteries) where worked on novel battery technologies. Before industry, she spent six years as a postdoctoral researcher: at the University of Surrey, focusing on fuel cell materials; and Loughborough University, investigating pigments. She received her PhD from Keele University through a postgraduate training partnership with CERAM, holds a MSc in New Materials from the University of Aberdeen, and a BSc in Chemistry from the University of Manchester.

Q+A

How did you first become interested in chemistry?

I was good at two things at school – music and chemistry – and whilst music was a big part of my life I didn’t see it as a career choice. I therefore chose to do chemistry, particularly as colour – paints, pigments and dyes – was something that I loved from an early age in art and crafts. I first thought of doing colour chemistry as a degree and instead chose chemistry at Manchester.

What motivates you?

After doing a placement in producing colours on glazed tiles as part of my New Materials MSc, I realised that I was motivated through the discovery and application of materials. To understand and discover new aspects of how materials chemistry and science can help to improve or create new technologies still motivates my work in sustainable batteries today.

What has been a highlight for you (either personally or in your career)?

One of my highlights was being able to publish a paper with my father, a computational chemist, in Nature Materials.

What is your favourite element?

I keep on swithering between tin and tungsten as my favourite element. I think in this case I will stick with tin; recently we have shown that tin can help stabilise a variety of materials for use in batteries.