Professor Scott Habershon

Winner: 2024 Faraday mid-career prize: Bourke-Liversidge Prize

University of Warwick

For the development of innovative computational simulation methods to predict molecular dynamics across the timescales of chemistry.

Celebrate Professor Scott Habershon

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Every scientist knows the feeling of discovery – there is a brief window of time when you've first discovered something or come up with a new insight, and you're the only person in the world who knows! That's a great feeling, and sharing that new knowledge or idea with others is brilliant, too.

The dynamics of molecular motion and chemical reactions span an enormous range of timescales, from the ultrafast photochemistry of vision and photosynthesis to the years-to-decades-long breakdown of plastics.

Professor Habershon’s research team uses computers to simulate this wide range of chemical timescales: they write video-game-like simulations that mimic the real world and help us understand how chemical reactions happen at the microscopic level of atoms and molecules.

The group’s simulations enable them to make predictions about how different molecules will react and behave in the future and offer an important alternative to experimental chemistry. For example, the group is building computer models of how plastics might break down in the environment over the coming decades – an approach that is faster than waiting for plastics to degrade in the lab. They are also using computers to search for new catalysts that can transform carbon dioxide into other useful chemicals rather than letting it escape into the atmosphere. These examples show how computer simulations can complement lab-based chemistry in addressing some of the most important global challenges that we face.

Read winner biography

Scott Habershon is Professor of Computational and Theoretical Chemistry at the University of Warwick. Born in Sheffield, he studied natural sciences as an undergraduate at the University of Birmingham (2001) before continuing to study a PhD in chemistry with Kenneth Harris and Roy Johnston (2004). He then joined the group of Ahmed Zewail at Caltech before returning to a postdoctoral position in Oxford with David Manolopoulos. In 2010, he was awarded a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship at the University of Bristol before being appointed at Warwick in 2012.

The Habershon research group works on creative new solutions to simulate chemical dynamics across a range of different timescales. Examples include using machine-learning to accelerate computationally-demanding photochemistry simulations, developing automated chemical reaction discovery schemes to map out and predict the kinetics of complex molecular systems, and exploring new self-writing computer codes to simulate chemical dynamics.

Q&A

How did you first become interested in chemistry?

I was lucky to have had a fantastic chemistry teacher when I was an A-level student – Mr Thomson at the Dronfield School, near Sheffield. His enthusiasm was infectious. I can still remember lots of experiments that we performed in his class, like making aspirin. His chemistry classes helped me to understand why chemistry is so important and interesting, and that feeling of excitement at learning new things never left me.

What motivates you?

What advice would you give to a young person considering a career in chemistry?

Science is a creative activity - don't be afraid to be curious, inquisitive, and inventive.

Can you tell us about a scientific development on the horizon that you are excited about?

As a computational chemist, I'm interested in the possibilities of quantum computing. It's not yet clear (to me, anyway) how future chemists will routinely use such technologies, but the concepts and ideas being explored at the interface of quantum technologies and chemistry are certainly highlighting different ways of thinking about chemistry on computers.

Why is chemistry important?

There are so many global challenges that demand chemistry problem-solving – climate change and carbon dioxide mitigation, plastic pollution, sustainable materials, clean water, air pollution, antibiotic drug development, and more. Chemistry provides a pathway to addressing these challenges by turning knowledge of molecular-level processes into real-world applications that will make the world a safer, healthier, and more equal place.