I received my MChem degree in chemistry from the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom, with a 1st Class distinction and Honors in 2013. Projects were largely experimental and along the lines of synthetic organic chemistry. I learnt that experiments can be probed with theoretical approaches to give insights not easily obtained in the lab, and sometimes, at a faster pace. I thus pursued a PhD with the Gunnell and Matthews Scholarship, also at Leeds, that contained elements of both computational and synthetic chemistry and was defended in 2017. My thesis covered several areas but the main theme was the computational design and synthesis of conjugated organic materials for semiconductor applications, which won the School’s J B Cohen Prize the following year, in 2018. During these years, I’ve been involved in various activities, including a mentor, a sub-warden, a committee treasurer for the postgraduate chemistry society, and demonstrated to foundation, first and third year BSc & MChem degree participants. In 2017, I became a member of the Royal Society of Chemistry (MRSC) in the UK and a member of the American Chemical Society in 2019.

I was fortunate to undertake a year in industry as part of my first degree and then work in Japan for a couple of months during my PhD, all of which proved invaluable experience. I then moved to Evanston in the US and started work as a Postdoctoral Fellow at Northwestern in the Ratner group from February 2018, and now continuing in the Schatz group from 2019 to present. I am a computational materials chemist who specializes in electronic structure, properties and reactivity. My interests include the sustainable separation of metals from electronic waste (recycling); electronic structure and properties of organic semiconductors, semi-metallic complexes and nanomaterials for optoelectronic applications, such as molecular junctions; charge transport and non-fullerene acceptors in organic photovoltaics (OPVs); novel supramolecular materials; functionalized 2D materials and surface chemistry; heterogeneous catalysis; and reaction mechanisms.

 

Email: leighton.jones@northwestern.edu

Twitter: @LeightonOJones

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leighton-jones

Personal Website:  https://sites.google.com/view/leighton-owen-jones/home

Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=rvS6GXEAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate