QMUL School of Engineering and Materials Science News

Celebrating NSS success & leading the way in Student Voice

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Wed, 15 Jul 2026 23:00:00 +0100

As Queen Mary celebrates our results in the National Student Survey (NSS), the School of Engineering and Materials Science has seen some of the greatest improvement in the University.

We saw particular successes in Student Voice and Academic Support, with Aerospace Engineering – and Engineering as a whole - coming first in London for Student Voice, showing that students feel their opinions are listened to, and that they have power to make change.

Engineering at Queen Mary also came first in London and 7th in the UK for Assessment & Feedback, and first in London and 9th in the UK for Academic Support.

Other successes include:

Second in the UK for Organisation & Management and Student Voice in Materials Science
First in London and third in the UK for Student Voice in our Mechanical Engineering courses
First in London and Fourth in the UK for Student Voice in Production & Manufacturing Engineering

Head of School, Professor Hazel Screen said “Our NSS results have improved significantly this year. These achievements reflect the dedication and commitment of all our staff”

Director of Education, Dr Sara Hejikazemi said “These results reflect the contributions of all colleagues involved in teaching, assessment, student support, technical services, professional services, programme leadership, and the many behind-the-scenes activities that help create a positive student experience. It is clear that our students feel listened to, supported and valued, which is something we should all be proud of.”

Innovative capsule endoscope designed by Queen Mary researchers granted patent

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Tue, 14 Jul 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Congratulations to Dr Hasan Shaheed, Dr Mohamed Adhnan Thaha, and Dr Julius Bernth on being granted their European patent for CE-Move, an innovative locomotion system for capsule endoscopes.

Today’s capsule endoscopes are little more than pills, swallowed like any other pill. Once swallowed, the only movement comes from gravity and your own body – both of which are a one-way system!

CE-Move uses electromagnetic principles to produce motion. An electromagnetic coil slides forward around a rail to create an impact force, propelling it forwards.

Everything is contained within the capsule itself, so it keeps its streamlined shape. There are no legs, wheels, tracks, propellors or any other external mechanisms which could get stuck, break off or damage tissues.

CE-Move will be the sister-spinout of CE-Track, an intelligent tracking system for locating the capsule. When used together, the two technologies give clinicians complete control over the capsule endoscope.

No longer merely a passive pill, these innovations represent a new generation of medical robots which could one day perform treatment as well as diagnostics inside the bowel.

EduGrade AI Receives $100,000 Microsoft Azure credits through the Microsoft for Startups programme

d.deepshikha@qmul.ac.uk (Deepshikha Deepshikha) — Tue, 14 Jul 2026 23:00:00 +0100

EduGrade AI, an AI-powered assessment and feedback platform developed at the School of Engineering and Materials Science (SEMS), Queen Mary University of London, has secured $100,000 in Microsoft Azure credits through the Microsoft for Startups programme.

The credits will support the continued development and scaling of EduGrade AI, enabling the team to expand its secure cloud infrastructure, enhance AI capabilities, and support pilots with higher education institutions.

Led by Dr Deepshikha, EduGrade AI has been designed to support educators by generating rubric-aligned draft feedback and indicative marking while ensuring that academic judgement remains central through a human-in-the-loop approach. The platform aims to improve consistency, reduce marking workload, and provide students with more timely, high-quality feedback.

Receiving Microsoft Azure support represents another important milestone for the project, which has already attracted interest from universities in the UK and internationally. The Azure credits will enable the team to accelerate technical development, strengthen platform scalability, and further evaluate the technology across diverse educational settings.

Commenting on the achievement, Dr Deepshikha said:

"This support from Microsoft for Startups will significantly accelerate the next stage of EduGrade AI's development. It enables us to focus on building a robust, scalable platform that empowers educators while promoting responsible and transparent use of AI in assessment and feedback. We look forward to expanding our collaborations with universities."

EduGrade AI forms part of SEMS' growing portfolio of innovation in artificial intelligence for education, demonstrating how engineering, digital technologies, and educational research can come together to address real-world challenges in higher education.

Queen Mary Chemical Engineering students shortlisted in Young Engineers Awards for Innovation and Sustainability

f.akinmolayan@qmul.ac.uk (Folashade Akinmolayan Taiwo) — Wed, 08 Jul 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Eight Chemical Engineering students from Queen Mary University of London attend the 2026 Young Engineers Awards for Innovation and Sustainability (YEAIS), hosted by the Institution of Chemical Engineers (IChemE) at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre.

The annual awards celebrate innovation, creativity and sustainability in chemical engineering, bringing together undergraduate finalists, graduate engineers, industry professionals and employers from across the UK. This year's event showcased projects addressing some of the sector's most pressing challenges, from digitalisation and artificial intelligence to energy, climate action and sustainable manufacturing.

Among the Queen Mary attendees were students whose project was shortlisted in the Energy and Climate Action category. The event provided an opportunity to present their work, engage with fellow students and professionals, and gain valuable insights into the future of the profession.

Reflecting on the experience, one student said:

"It was a great opportunity to meet fellow undergraduates, graduate engineers and industry experts, and to hear new ideas and perspectives related to a more sustainable future. One of the biggest takeaways was speaking with graduate engineers about entering the workplace and how sustainability is being increasingly embedded across a wide range of roles. It was inspiring to see how graduate careers are evolving alongside the industry's sustainability goals."

In addition to celebrating the achievements of this year's finalists, the event enabled students to expand their professional networks, learn about emerging trends in sustainable engineering and explore future career opportunities within the chemical engineering sector.

Providing opportunities for students to participate in national events such as YEAIS reflects Queen Mary's commitment to enhancing the student experience through opportunities that connect academic learning with professional practice. By engaging with leading engineers, employers and peers from across the UK, students gain valuable experience, broaden their perspectives and strengthen the skills and networks that will support their future careers.

Congratulations to all of the Queen Mary students who took part in this year's awards and represented the university at this prestigious national event.

HEPI publishes Dr Folashade Akinmolayan Taiwo's latest blog on AI and collaborative learning

f.akinmolayan@qmul.ac.uk (Folashade Akinmolayan Taiwo) — Wed, 08 Jul 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Dr Folashade Akinmolayan Taiwo has authored a new blog for the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI), the UK's only independent higher education think tank.

HEPI is recognised for producing evidence-based research and commentary that informs higher education policy and practice. Its publications are widely read by policymakers, university leaders and higher education professionals.

In the blog, Is AI quietly eroding the social core of student teamwork?, Dr Akinmolayan Taiwo examines how generative artificial intelligence is transforming collaborative learning in higher education. While AI tools offer clear benefits by improving efficiency, accessibility and productivity, the blog argues that their increasing use may inadvertently reduce opportunities for students to develop the interpersonal and professional skills that emerge through working together.

The blog explores how AI can become an intermediary in group work, replacing the conversations, negotiation and shared problem-solving that are fundamental to effective collaboration. It argues that these interactions are not incidental to learning but are essential for developing communication, teamwork, leadership and critical thinking skills that graduates need in the workplace.

Rather than advocating for restrictions on AI, the post calls for a balanced approach that enables students to use AI responsibly while preserving the human aspects of collaborative learning. It recommends embedding AI literacy into curricula, redesigning group assessments to encourage transparency and reflection on AI use, and providing clear guidance for students and educators on how AI can enhance, rather than replace, meaningful teamwork.

The blog contributes to the growing national discussion on the opportunities and challenges presented by generative AI in higher education, highlighting the importance of ensuring that technological innovation strengthens rather than diminishes the student learning experience.

This blog reflects Queen Mary's commitment to shaping the future of higher education through research and innovation. By exploring the opportunities and challenges of generative AI in collaborative learning, it contributes to sector-wide conversations about ensuring technological advances strengthen, rather than diminish, the interpersonal skills and collaborative experiences that underpin student success.

Queen Mary Materials technology on display at the NEC

o.fenwick@qmul.ac.uk (Oliver Fenwick) — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Technology from Queen Mary's School of Engineering and Materials Science (SEMS) was exhibited at the Advanced Materials Show at the NEC in Birmingham.

The trade fair, which takes place alongside the Advanced Ceramics Show, the Vehicle Electrification Expo and the Battery Cells & Systems Expo, featured over 300 exhibitors along with 100 speakers, and attracted more than 4000 visitors.

The Queen Mary stand had objects on display showcasing battery technology, AI-designed cellular structures, bone graft substitute materials developed by Queen Mary researchers, graphene technology, sensors and more. All of these objects attracted many new industry contacts who we hope to work with closely in the future.

SEMS spin-out, EcoBarrier, joined us on the stand. EcoBarrier was spun-out of pioneering work by Dr Colin Crick into superhydrophobic coatings. EcoBarrier-Food^TM is their latest coating. Developed utilising entirely natural materials, the coating delivers superior water resistance, low water vapor transmission rates, and low gas transmission rates. EcoBarrier coatings maintain complete compatibility with existing industrial composting and standard recycling infrastructures enabling use in the food industry.

In addition, Dr Xuekun Lu gave a fantastic talk on his in-operando tomography techniques for batteries that drew plenty of attention.

Dr Rehan Shah engages in mathematics scholarship work at Cambridge research retreat

rehan.shah@qmul.ac.uk (Rehan Shah) — Mon, 06 Jul 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Dr Rehan Shah engaged in pursuing mathematics education scholarship research at the prestigious Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) in Cambridge as part of the academic mathematicians' retreat programme held this summer from 28th June to 4th July 2026.

INI Retreats offer mathematical scientists a welcoming and conducive space for a week-long retreat to re-immerse themselves in research or make progress on a project away from their usual commitments. Researchers are based in INI’s bespoke building in Cambridge and provided with dedicated office space and accommodation in INI flats.

Dr Shah used the retreat to meet with his research collaborator, Dr Maurice Chiodo (Assistant Research Professor in the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk, University of Cambridge) to work on his ongoing mathematics scholarship research project that is dedicated to understanding the need for the consideration of wider societal aspects within mathematics and to outlining some of the ways in which we can incorporate the teaching of ethics and sustainability within mathematics courses at university. The final output involves the compilation of a teaching resource toolkit, which will be published by Open Book Publishers, as an open-access book, containing a set of varied mathematical problems across different topics with key ethical and sustainability aspects embedded within them for use by lecturers and educators.

Dr Shah also used his dedicated office space and facilities to work on another of his mathematics scholarship research project focused on undertaking a systematic landscape literature review of mathematical anxiety faced by UK HE students studying mathematics degree programmes as documented over the past 50 years, with his academic collaborator, Dr Ric Crossman (Associate Professor, University of Durham). In addition to pursuing his research endeavors, the retreat also afforded Dr Shah significant opportunities for networking and interaction with other programme participants, to build valuable cross-institutional collaborations.

James Busfield's Group Publish Science Advances Paper on Robots that can “see” touch thanks to a new colour-changing tactile sensor

j.busfield@qmul.ac.uk (James Busfield) — Thu, 02 Jul 2026 23:00:00 +0100

The novel idea created by Giacomo Sasso, whilst he was a postdoctoral researcher in SEMS at Queen Mary University of London, working with Prof James Busfield, and it works by transforming invisible forces into dynamic colour patterns. This enables high-resolution maps to contact, strain and pressure to emerge instantly. When pressure is applied to a soft sensing surface, the material produces spatially varying structural colours that can be captured immediately using a standard camera, removing the need for complex reconstruction algorithms.

This technology enables the development of a robotic gripper assembling micro-scale components with the delicacy required in precision manufacturing, where every subtle variation in force becomes visible in real time. It can make a concurrent impact in healthcare where an external prosthetic (artificial limb) can get a richer sense of touch during delicate daily or clinical tasks. Simultaneously, it can allow surgical systems to distinguish healthy from abnormal tissue by reading fine pressure signatures directly through the material’s colour response.

Unlike traditional tactile sensors, the new system embeds sensing directly into the material itself. Mechanical interactions are transformed into colour fields that a low-cost USB camera can read in real time. The challenging task has already obtained results showcasing the first real-time solution in the field.

“You won’t guess how much information is generated when your finger presses a light switch. A human hand contains more than 10,000 mechanoreceptors to do the job, yet touch sensing remains one of the major challenges in robotics. We were happy to capture the finger ridges, as no existing technology can reproduce such sensor density at comparable scale and simplicity. The key idea behind this project was to think outside the box: instead of embedding dense and overengineered sensor arrays, sensing is moved into the material itself, where mechanical cues are directly transformed into colour fields and captured using a simple low-cost USB camera” says Giacomo Sasso. This produces rich pressure maps while simplifying the system architecture.

Co-authors on this project included collaborators from the University of Florence, University of Trieste and University of Trento in Italy agree with Professor James Busfield when he says “What is particularly powerful is that the information is already in the light signal. You are no longer reconstructing touch - you are observing it directly.”

The idea emerged from the need to overcome a persistent trade-off in vision-based tactile sensing: high-resolution systems typically require heavy computational pipelines to reconstruct contact geometry, introducing latency, while faster systems often sacrifice spatial detail.

The strong collaboration between Professor Federico Carpi, from the University of Florence and Professor Busfield, merges two research worlds of soft robotics and material science. Building on years of work on stretchable sensors and polymer characterisation, the team has progressively advanced the ability to interface mechanical compliance with functional sensing. Within this framework, mechanochromic materials represent a new direction: instead of relying on highly engineered microelectronics to interpret deformation (taxels), the material itself becomes the sensing medium, directly encoding mechanical interaction into visible optical signals.

You can read the full paper on the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Queen Mary to lead €3.7m European doctoral network advancing AI-accelerated modelling for clean energy and propulsion

a.paykani@qmul.ac.uk (Amin Paykani) — Wed, 01 Jul 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Queen Mary University of London will coordinate a major new Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Doctoral Network to train twelve PhD students as the next generation of researchers working at the interface of artificial intelligence, high performance computing and chemically reactive flows.

The project, ASCEND – Next-Generation Accelerated and Scalable Modelling Frameworks for Chemically Reactive Flows, has received €3.7 million in EU funding through the Horizon Europe MSCA Doctoral Networks programme.

Reactive flows are central to many technologies that underpin the transition to cleaner energy systems, including low- and zero-carbon fuels, sustainable propulsion, power generation and fire-safety applications. However, accurately simulating these systems remains computationally demanding because they involve complex interactions between fluid dynamics, turbulence, chemical reactions, heat transfer and emissions formation. ASCEND will address this challenge by developing new modelling frameworks that combine scientific machine learning, high performance computing and computational fluid dynamics. The ambition is to deliver fast, trustworthy and scalable simulation tools capable of reducing computational cost by orders of magnitude while preserving the physical fidelity required for predictive engineering design.

The consortium is coordinated by Dr Amin Paykani, Senior Lecturer in Sustainable Propulsion Systems in the School of Engineering and Materials Science, with support from Professor Xi Jiang and Dr Alexander Shestopaloff. Queen Mary will lead the overall coordination and contribute research expertise in combustion modelling, machine learning for chemically reactive systems, and uncertainty-aware modelling. ASCEND brings together Queen Mary University of London, Technische Universität Darmstadt, Ghent University, Technische Universität Braunschweig, the University of Edinburgh and Barcelona Supercomputing Centre. The network is supported by a wide group of associated partners, including Shell Research, Siemens Energy Industrial Turbomachinery, Etex, Virtwin Energy, Forschungszentrum Jülich, ETH Zurich, CNRS, North Carolina State University and Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya.

The award marks a significant success for Queen Mary’s growing research leadership in sustainable propulsion, AI-enabled engineering and European doctoral training. By combining advanced simulation, artificial intelligence and doctoral training, ASCEND will contribute to Europe’s green and digital transitions and strengthen Queen Mary’s role as a coordinator of international research networks addressing major challenges in clean energy, sustainable propulsion and computational engineering.

Dr Majid Taghavi appointed Vice President of the EuroEAP Society

m.taghavi@qmul.ac.uk (Majid Taghavi) — Mon, 29 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Dr Majid Taghavi was appointed Vice President of the EuroEAP Society (European Society for Electromechanically Active Polymer Transducers & Artificial Muscles), an international scientific society dedicated to advancing research and innovation in electroactive polymers, soft transducers, and artificial muscles.

The Society brings together leading researchers and industry partners to promote collaboration, knowledge exchange, and the development of next-generation soft actuators, sensing, and energy-harvesting technologies. In his leadership role, Majid will contribute to shaping the Society's strategic direction and strengthening the global electroactive polymer research community.

Alum Dr Farah Ahmed named in Women’s Engineering Society’s Top 50 Women in Engineering 2026

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Mon, 22 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Queen Mary Engineering alum Dr Farah Ahmed has been named one of the Women’s Engineering Society’s (WES) Top 50 Women in Engineering (WE50) 2026, one of the UK’s most prestigious recognitions celebrating the achievements and contributions of women in engineering.

Dr Ahmed completed a PhD in Biophysics and Biomechanics at Queen Mary's School of Engineering and Materials Science in 2010 and continued working in the school as a Research Assistant for a short while afterwards.

She is now Managing Director at Secretariat, a legal and risk consultancy, which announced the news on International Women in Engineering Day.

The annual WE50 awards, announced in conjunction with International Women in Engineering Day (INWED), recognize women who are making significant contributions to the engineering profession through technical excellence, leadership, innovation, and impact. This year’s theme, Engineering Intelligence, highlights the role of engineering expertise, creativity, and problem-solving in addressing complex challenges across industries.

Dr Ahmed is a globally recognized expert in product safety, reliability, and failure analysis who advises clients across a wide range of industries on complex technical, regulatory, and operational challenges. Her expertise spans materials science, advanced imaging, destructive and non-destructive evaluation, and fracture mechanics, and she has led investigations involving consumer products, electronics, medical devices, automotive systems, aerospace components, pharmaceuticals, and industrial equipment. Beyond her client work, Dr Ahmed is an active contributor to the engineering community through research, mentorship, and professional leadership, including as Founder and President of Tomography for Scientific Advancement (ToScA), an international organization dedicated to advancing the application of X-ray computed tomography across science and engineering.

Celebrating the news on her LinkedIn page, Dr Ahmed said "I am truly humbled to be recognised among the Top 50 Women Engineers in the UK on a day dedicated to celebrating women engineers across the globe.

At today’s celebrations at the House of Lords, I was asked a simple question: “How did you get into Engineering?” My answer was equally simple: “I was a curious kid.”

It was a privilege to meet so many remarkable women engineers from diverse disciplines and at different stages of their careers. Each had a unique story to tell and each is making an incredible contribution to our profession.

Thank you to Secretariat and Dr Ahmed for their words in this story.

Queen Mary University of London and Archipelago ‘KTP’ Project Earns Prestigious “Outstanding” Rating

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Mon, 22 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Innovate UK Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTPs) connect businesses with academic expertise to turn innovative ideas into real-world impact. Every KTP is a collaboration between a postgraduate researcher (the Associate), a business, and a university (Knowledge Base; this involves the principal investigators and business development team).

The KTP between Queen Mary University of London and Archipelago Technology Group Ltd has been awarded the highest possible “Outstanding” rating and a Certificate of Excellence from Innovate UK. With only around 10% of KTP projects achieving this grade, the award reflects the strength of the team and the significant impact on both innovation and industry that the work produced.

Archipelago is a deep-tech company based in Cambridge, UK. Its core technology, Powerdrop™, is a non-contact coating system capable of producing pinhole-free barrier layers. A key application is the coating of paper-based materials to replace plastic packaging at scale, with the potential to significantly reduce global plastic waste.

Archipelago’s collaboration with Queen Mary eventually grew to the first KTP. The project brought together teams from Archipelago, Queen Mary, and University College London (UCL) to advance the Powerdrop™ non-contact coating technology. The work enhanced the understanding of the system’s end-to-end coating process. It allowed overcoming the speed limitations, improved the performance of the system, and enabled it to handle a wider range of high-viscosity materials. It also supports more sustainable manufacturing approaches, including potential reductions in plastic use in packaging.

The project was led by two KTP Associates: Lekshmi Bindhu Sunilkumar, a physicist who completed her PhD at the National Institute of Technology Calicut, India, and Faisal Manzoor, holding a PhD in Materials Engineering, Ulster University. Both of them have since started promising careers: Faisal is now a lecturer at Ulster, and Lekshmi is an inkjet scientist at Dandy.

Lekshmi and Faisal have been supervised simultaneously by the academic team from Queen Mary and the business team from Archipelago. The academic team consisted of Radomir Slavchov (supervisor) and Rafa Castrejon-Pita (academic lead, formerly Queen Mary, now UCL). Their internationally recognised expertise in surface science, capillarity, fluid dynamics, inkjet systems, microfluidics, and high-speed imaging was central to the project’s success. The Archipelago team included the business supervisor, Jane List, and was led by Guy Newcombe (CEO) and Dan Mace.

Working closely with the project team, Lekshmi and Faisal applied high-speed photography, surface science knowledge, and rigorous experimental methods to develop reliable pinhole-free coatings for a wide range of cellulose-based containers. The resulting materials were judged “best in class” by leading international brand owners.

Building on this success, Queen Mary has recently secured a second KTP with Archipelago Group, enabling the partnership to further advance the Powerdrop™ process and accelerate the development of sustainable coating technologies for industry. The focus of the new project is on how to make a porous cellulose-based material impermeable to water, oil, and air by coating it without it losing its recyclability.

This work was supported by the Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTP) programme, funded by Innovate UK and Archipelago Technology Group Ltd (Grant No. 10019184).

International Women in Engineering Day: Engineering Intelligence with Dr Deepshikha

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Mon, 22 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

This year's theme for International Women in Engineering Day is Engineering Intelligence, so we're highlighting the work of one of our academics who is researching, advising and innovating Artificial Intelligence for education.

Dr Deepshikha is a founder of EduMark AI, an educator-controlled platform designed to support rubric-based marking, personalised feedback and human-in-the-loop academic judgement.

In her materials science and chemistry research and teaching, she is an expert in graphene, but her recent interest has turned her into a thought-leader in AI and its applications in Higher Education.

Her academic background demonstrates a strong interest in both science and education. She achieved a first-class degree in Education, was awarded a Gold Medal in her Master’s in Chemistry, completed her PhD in Chemistry, and undertook postdoctoral research, developing specialist expertise in nanochemistry.

Her current work "focuses on ensuring that AI supports, rather than replaces, academic judgement, while improving feedback quality, assessment literacy and student confidence” and “contributes to international conversations on how AI can be used responsibly and meaningfully in higher education.”

Deepshikha was awarded Queen Mary’s President and Principal’s Award for Educational Excellence 2025, recognising her leadership, educational innovation, and impactful work in advancing AI-enabled assessment and feedback through her EduMark AI project.

Deepshikha was recently selected for a Google fellowship – the Higher Education Faculty AI Fellowship which is “shaping the future of AI in Higher Education”. Google says that the cohort is "some of the most forward-thinking minds in academia globally," with successful applicants chosen because they "don't just see the potential of AI, they see the responsibility that comes with it." The fellowship will support Deepshikha in leadership and developing strategies for using AI for institutional impact.

She said, “I am looking forward to working with colleagues across the EMEA region to explore scalable, ethical and student-centred approaches to AI in assessment and learning.”

Deepshikha has also been selected to be featured in OpenAI’s global “Professors Teaching with AI” series, recognising her innovative work on EduMark AI and her contribution to advancing responsible, student-centred applications of AI in assessment and feedback.

Deepshikha has also been awarded an AI Skills 4 Women scholarship from Microsoft – recognising her as an emerging leader in driving real-world AI applications and responsible digital transformation. She has been accepted onto the Innovate UK ICURe Explore Programme (£35,000) to help bring her research with EduMark AI to market, and EduMark has been awarded £9,000 from the Queen Mary Impact Fund for a project on AI-enabled Assessment.

She spoke to us about her work and inspiration.

What interested you about studying chemistry and materials?

My interest in chemistry and materials began with a fascination with understanding how the smallest changes at the molecular or nanoscale level can significantly influence the properties and behaviour of materials. Chemistry gives us the language to understand matter, while materials science allows us to apply that understanding to real-world problems.

During my PhD, I worked on the synthesis and characterisation of nanostructured conducting polymers for biosensor applications. This gave me a strong appreciation of how interdisciplinary materials research can contribute to areas such as healthcare, energy, electronics and environmental technologies. Later, my postdoctoral research on graphene-based devices further strengthened my interest in advanced materials and their potential to address global challenges. I have always been drawn to the way materials science sits at the intersection of chemistry, physics, engineering and innovation.

What was the catalyst that inspired you to start researching AI?

The main catalyst was my teaching and assessment practice. As an educator, I became increasingly aware of the amount of time academics spend marking, giving feedback, and ensuring that students receive comments that are timely, personalised, and useful for improvement. I also saw that students often need feedback earlier, while it is still actionable, rather than only after summative assessment.

This led me to explore whether AI could be used responsibly to support assessment and feedback processes. My work on EduMark AI grew from this need. The project investigates how AI can assist educators with grading and personalised feedback while keeping academic judgement, educator review and ethical governance at the centre. I am particularly interested in how AI can support consistency, transparency and assessment literacy, rather than simply speeding up marking.

For me, AI became a research interest because it offered a practical way to address a real educational challenge: how to provide high-quality, timely, and meaningful feedback at scale without removing the human expertise essential to good education.

What makes you passionate about education?

Education has the power to change confidence, opportunity and life direction. I am passionate about teaching because I enjoy helping students move from uncertainty to understanding, especially in subjects that can initially feel difficult or abstract, such as chemistry, materials science and engineering concepts.

My teaching approach is built around making learning active, inclusive and connected to real-world applications. I enjoy active learning using simulations, virtual labs, co-created assessments, problem-solving activities and authentic examples to help students see why their learning matters. I am also particularly passionate about assessment, feedback and feedforward. For me, feedback should not simply explain what went wrong after an assessment has ended; it should help students understand how to improve, what steps to take next, and how to apply that learning to future tasks. This feedforward approach is central to my educational practice because it turns assessment into a developmental learning process rather than a final judgement.

As an educator, I find it very rewarding to support diverse learners and to create learning environments where students feel encouraged, challenged and capable of progressing. Seeing students gain confidence, act on feedback and improve over time is one of the most meaningful aspects of teaching for me.

How do you see AI impacting the future of education?

I see AI having a significant impact on the future of education, but I believe that impact must be guided by responsibility, transparency and human oversight. AI has the potential to support personalised learning, provide timely formative feedback, help students practise before summative assessments, and assist educators with time-intensive tasks such as drafting initial feedback, mapping rubrics, and identifying common learning gaps.

However, AI should not replace the educator. The most valuable future is one where AI acts as a supportive partner, helping teachers and students make better use of time, evidence and feedback. Educators will remain essential for interpretation, empathy, disciplinary judgement, ethical decision-making and understanding the wider context of student learning.

In the future, I hope AI will help us move towards assessment models that are more authentic, transparent and developmental. Used well, AI can help students build confidence, understand standards, practise more effectively and receive feedback when it can still make a difference. The challenge is to ensure that AI is used in ways that strengthen trust, fairness and learning, rather than creating new risks or reducing education to automation.

Research by Queen Mary academics accepted into Engineering and Medicine Biology conference

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Sun, 21 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Research by Queen Mary academics has been accepted into Engineering and Medicine Biology conference 2026 in Toronto on 27th July.

The research, by Sardar Wasif Ashraf Khan, Dr Roberto Volpe and Tayyab Ahmad Ansari, focuses on a low-cost automated dip-coating system and a PVA-assisted fabrication approach for producing polymeric membranes intended for heart valve leaflet applications.

This is relevant to biomedical engineering because material fabrication, membrane uniformity and scalable processing are important challenges in the development of polymer-based cardiovascular device components.

Their paper titled “Low-Cost Automated Dip-Coater and PVA-Assisted Fabrication of Polymeric Heart Valve Leaflet Membranes.” will be presented as part of the Devices & Wearables section of the conference.

The research forms part of Sardar's PhD research on polymeric materials and fabrication approaches for heart valve leaflet applications. He said "I am very pleased that this work has been accepted for poster presentation at EMBC 2026. This is an important milestone in my PhD research, as it gives us the opportunity to share our work on low-cost automated dip-coating and PVA-assisted fabrication of polymeric membranes for heart valve leaflet applications with an international biomedical engineering audience. I am grateful for the guidance and support of Dr Roberto Volpe and for the collaboration with Tayyab Ahmad Ansari throughout this work."

Students take flight in drone-building event in the Makerspace

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Tue, 16 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Over the course of two lively and hands-on days, the Makerspace played host to a collaborative event co-created by the Materials Science and Engineering Society and Engineers Without Borders, bringing together over 30 enthusiastic students to design, assemble, and fly quadcopter drones.

The event provided an opportunity for students from across undergraduate programmes and year groups to come together in a practical, team-focused environment. Participants worked in small groups to build fully functioning drones from component kits, encouraging both technical learning and cross-cohort collaboration.

Students developed a wide range of valuable skills throughout the workshop. These included soldering electronic components, interpreting engineering drawings, and carrying out precise practical assembly tasks. Beyond the build itself, participants also gained confidence in drone flight, with a simulator allowing pilots to practice before flying their creations for real. Equally important was the collaborative aspect of the experience. By working in mixed groups across programmes and years, students built connections beyond their usual academic circles, sharing knowledge and problem-solving together in a supportive, interdisciplinary setting.

President of the Materials Science and Engineering Society and one of the student organisers of the event, Abdirahman Mohamed said "This workshop is just the start, we are already planning to run it again next year. Ultimately, we want to see more students getting hands on experience like this with similar projects running year-round across the School."

Engineering the Biology of Birth: Mia Crowther successfully defends PhD

t.t.chowdhury@qmul.ac.uk (Tina Chowdhury) — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

The Centre for Bioengineering is delighted to congratulate Dr Mia Crowther on the successful defence of her PhD, marking the culmination of an outstanding programme of multidisciplinary research aimed at improving our understanding of preterm birth.

Supervised by Tina Chowdhury and Professor Anna David, Mia's doctoral research investigated how the mechanical and biological properties of the fetal membranes change during complicated pregnancies. Our work combined biomechanics, computational modelling, advanced imaging tools and cell biology to uncover why fetal membranes weaken and rupture too early leading to preterm birth.

Preterm birth remains the leading cause of death and disability in children under five years of age. Throughout her PhD, Mia developed innovative multiscale computational models of the fetal membrane and integrated tissue mechanics with quantitative cell analysis. This multidisciplinary approach enabled Mia to demonstrate how maternal age, gestation, obesity, fetal sex and pregnancy complications such as Gestational Diabetes or pre-eclampsia influence the biomechanics of the fetal membranes and their ability to repair following injury.

A major contribution of Mia's research was identifying the important roles of collagen organisation, specialised repair cells known as myofibroblasts and the gap junction protein Cx43 in regulating fetal membrane healing and mechanical integrity. The findings provide new insights into the biological mechanisms that contribute to preterm membrane rupture and lay the foundations for future therapeutic strategies to prevent preterm birth.

During her PhD, Mia established an impressive international research profile. She presented her work at leading conferences, including the International Society for Prenatal Diagnosis (ISPD), the UK Preterm Birth Conference and BioMedEng. In 2023, she received the ISPD Lightning Communications Plenary Award for the best oral presentation. Her first-author manuscript, "Multiscale models reveal region-specific mechanical responses of the term amniotic membrane with maternal obesity and ageing," is currently under review for the Journal of Physiology Special Issue on Preterm Birth: Physiology, Pathophysiology and Metabolic Diseases.

Mia has also contributed to international collaborative research through publication with the Fetal Membrane Society in Placenta.

Dr Tina Chowdhury, Mia's PhD supervisor, said: "Mia has demonstrated exceptional dedication, creativity and resilience throughout her PhD. By combining engineering and reproductive biology, she has made important contributions to our understanding of fetal membrane biomechanics and preterm birth. Her achievements, from international awards and conference presentations to a first-author manuscript , reflect the outstanding quality of her research. Mia is a fantastic STEMM ambassador for the Centre for Bioengineering through her enthusiasm for public engagement, inspiring future scientists and communicating the real-world impact of our research".

Reflecting on her PhD journey, Dr Mia Crowther said: "My PhD has been an incredible opportunity to combine engineering with reproductive biology to answer clinically important questions about preterm birth. I am extremely grateful to my supervisors, collaborators, clinical partners and, most importantly, the pregnant women who who generously donated human tissue samples to support our research."

Research Beyond the Laboratory

Alongside her doctoral research, Dr Mia Crowther supported three major externally funded public engagement initiatives Engineer Your Story, Hidden Pollution and Engineer Your Story with AI , helping to communicate research on maternal and fetal health to wider audiences. She contributed to outreach activities that brought together scientists, clinicians, artists and schools to raise awareness of environmental factors affecting pregnancy and women's health.

As part of the Centre's award-winning Hidden Pollution initiative, Mia worked with school students, creative professionals and healthcare researchers to translate complex scientific concepts into accessible visual campaigns highlighting the impact of environmental pollution on vulnerable populations. Through these activities, she has helped inspire the next generation of scientists while demonstrating the importance of engineering research in addressing global health challenges. These initiatives reflect the Centre's commitment to ensuring that research informs public understanding, education and future policy.

This work was supported by Engineering Physical Sciences Research Council (EP/T518086/1), Wellcome (227199/Z/23/Z) and National Institute for Health Research Barts Biomedical Research Centre (NIHR203330).

Centre for Bioengineering congratulates Dr Mia Crowther on this outstanding achievement. On a personal note, Tina Chowdhury wishes Mia every success in her multidisciplinary scientific writing and research career and looks forward to her future achievements.

Dr Abu Bakar Dawood awarded Fellowship of Higher Education Academy (FHEA)

exx299@qmul.ac.uk (Abu Bakar Dawood) — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Dr Abu Bakar Dawood, Postdoctoral Research Associate in the School of Engineering and Materials Science, has been awarded Fellowship of Higher Education Academy (FHEA) through Queen Mary Academy's Teaching Recognition Programme. He was mentored through the application process by Dr Rehan Shah (SFHEA).

The fellowship recognises his sustained commitment to effective and inclusive teaching across undergraduate and postgraduate engineering programmes, drawing on more than seven years of experience at Queen Mary, spanning laboratory demonstrations, session leadership, curriculum redesign, and research supervision. His application highlighted his approach to evidence-informed curriculum design, inclusive teaching, and the integration of his research expertise in soft robotics and tactile sensing into his teaching practice. Three of his MSc supervisees have contributed to peer-reviewed journal publications as a direct outcome of his supervision.

Congratulations to Dr Dawood on this achievement.

Engineering student and Dr Rehan Shah present mathematics education research UK BSRLM conference

rehan.shah@qmul.ac.uk (Rehan Shah) — Sun, 14 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Third-year undergraduate student Ilanthiraiyan Sivagnanamoorthy (currently finishing a year-long industrial placement at GE Aerospace in Bristol) has successfully presented mathematics education research conducted with Dr Rehan Shah at the New Researchers Day for the British Society for Research into Learning Mathematics (BSRLM) Summer Conference held on 13th June 2026 at Kings College London.

The work presented by Ilan as part of a session chaired by Dr Shah, presented findings and reflections gathered from a cross-institutional staff-focused interactive mathematics education workshop focusing on 'threshold concepts' and delivered at Queen Mary University of London over the past 2 years that featured 26 academic lecturers and educators teaching undergraduate mathematics modules across various STEM disciplines.

Following a brief introduction to threshold concepts and their characteristics, participants were asked to identify and evaluate a set of concepts from a sample module description of a core first-year undergraduate applied mathematics module against key threshold concepts criteria. The results highlight that while participants found some concepts easier to classify than others, they also struggled to conclusively evaluate concepts against certain threshold characteristics.

The notion of ‘threshold concepts’ can be considered akin to a portal, opening a new and previously inaccessible view of a topic, without which students would be unable to progress intellectually. They are also known to be particularlytroublesome for students due to their being conceptually difficult, alien or counter-intuitive at face value. Within HE mathematics, research literature has identified several potential threshold concepts such as functions, limits, complex numbers and mathematical proofs. Therefore, there is a strong need for mathematics educators to identify and recognise the implications of potential threshold concepts that exist within undergraduate mathematics modules.

The work will be published as a short paper (co-authored by Ilan and Dr Shah) as part of the formal BSRLM conference proceedings very soon and feeds into Dr Shah's forthcoming journal publication focusing on a comprehensive systematic review of troublesome mathematics concepts within STEM disciplines.

Engineering students group disseminate scholarship research at Festival of Education

rehan.shah@qmul.ac.uk (Rehan Shah) — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Five undergraduate engineering students from Dr Rehan Shah's research group, 'QMULtipliers' showcased their scholarship research projects through poster presentations at the Queen Mary Festival of Education held on Tuesday 9th June 2026 in Queen Mary's Octagon.

The scholarship projects led by Dr Shah and his students included a diverse range of research topics that comprised:

1. 'STEMming the Gap': Empowering students through co-creation and evaluation of inclusive mathematics curricula: with student researchers - Ms. Amelia Stringfellow and Ms. Nilah Holmer (funded by SEMS - CREME Scholarship Research Grant)

2. ‘AI in Academia’: An audit of educational developers’ use of, and attitude towards GenAI in HE and FE: with student researchers - Ms. Maneeha Siddiki and Ms. Leonie Faulkner (funded by SEDA Research Grant) (also in collaboration with the University of Leeds and Hartpury University)

3. ‘SEED-AI’: Designing social enterprise education through AI-enabled student– community partnerships: student researchers - Ms. Sara Hamandi (funded by RAISE Research Grant) (also in collaboration with the UCL) (awarded 3rd Prize for Best Poster from a total of 62 posters presented)

All of the projects were extremely well received by academic colleagues as well educational developers from Queen Mary Academy, with the insightful talks and discussions sparking great potential for future cross-disciplinary collaborations across the university.

Dr Shah was extremely grateful to all his students for their painstaking contributions, stating that "the students with their enthusiasm and commitment emerged as the true highlight" in the promotion and dissemination of the impact of these projects on behalf of SEMS and CREME.

Dr Deepshikha reaches MassChallenge UK 2026 final with AI assessment venture

d.deepshikha@qmul.ac.uk (Deepshikha Deepshikha) — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Dr Deepshikha, from the School of Engineering and Materials Science at Queen Mary University of London, has been selected as a finalist for the MassChallenge UK 2026 Accelerator Programme through her education technology venture, EduGrade AI Ltd. The company was chosen following a highly competitive international selection process.

The recognition highlights the potential of EduGrade AI to transform assessment and feedback in higher education through responsible, educator-led artificial intelligence.

MassChallenge UK supports high-potential startups with expert mentoring, industry connections and investor engagement through a structured programme designed to help founders scale their impact. As a finalist, EduGrade AI will gain access to corporate partners, mentors, investors, and a global innovation community, as well as opportunities to compete for non-dilutive funding and in-kind support.

EduGrade AI builds on Dr Deepshikha's wider research at Queen Mary into AI-supported assessment and feedback, which focuses on personalised feedback, rubric-based assessment, assessment literacy and the responsible adoption of generative AI. The platform has been designed with a strong emphasis on human oversight, fairness, transparency and institutional trust.

"Being selected as a MassChallenge UK finalist is a tremendous validation of our mission to put educators at the centre of AI-supported assessment," said Dr Deepshikha. "I look forward to working with the programme's mentors and partners to bring fairer, more transparent feedback to students and staff across higher education."

Through the programme, EduGrade AI will continue developing its platform, deepen its engagement with mentors and partners, and explore opportunities to support universities and educators across the UK and internationally.

The selection reflects Queen Mary's growing contribution to innovation in education, digital assessment and responsible AI practice.

Queen Mary and SIIT inspire future health innovators through 2026 Health & Care Innovation Sprint

exy195@qmul.ac.uk (Chayabhan Limpabandhu) — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

The School of Engineering and Materials Science (SEMS) at Queen Mary University of London, through Prof Zion Tse, Assoc. Prof Waree Kongprawechnon, Dr Chayabhan Limpabandhu, and their team, has delivered the 2026 Health & Care Innovation Sprint in collaboration with the Sirindhorn International Institute of Technology (SIIT), Thammasat University, Thailand.

Supported by the British Council, this co-developed programme brought together academic expertise from both institutions to mentor students in developing creative solutions for global healthcare challenges. A special thank you to Dr Chinnapat Panwisawas for opening the session and sharing his inspiring career path from Thailand to the UK. His story left many students feeling encouraged and motivated.

The intensive seven-day initiative immersed students in UK academic culture through observational research and campus visits to Queen Mary University of London, King’s College London, Imperial College London, University College London, and the University of Oxford.

The programme culminated in a final showcase where four teams pitched their ideas:

CliniClear (Kanta and Chinchutha): An AI data-structuring tool using a secure QR-Bridge to streamline GP administrative history-taking.
Application for blind people (Baromkorn and Chartcharn): A hands-free indoor navigation app utilising audio-haptic feedback for the legally visually impaired.
Smart Dementia Glasses (Pawaris and Srigrid): AI glasses that provide navigation and facial recognition for patients while reducing caregiver workload.
TummyBuddy (Supphasan and Thanayos): A personalised digital assistant predicting gastrointestinal discomfort based on food composition.

The judging panel, which included Prof Zion Tse from Queen Mary and Assoc. Prof Waree Kongprawechnon, Asst. Prof Sasiporn Usanavasin, and Assoc. Prof Chalie Charoenlarpnopparut from SIIT praised the students for their caring, thoughtful, and human-centric approaches to healthcare challenges. To help the students foresee the long-term potential of their projects, the panel provided practical, multidimensional feedback that balanced clinical value and technological application with a forward-looking business strategy.

Students also reflected warmly on the experience, saying the programme gave them the chance to visit the UK as tourists and to explore university life, research, and innovation through campus tours. Through visits to leading institutions and conversations with academics, students and mentors, they were able to see different ways of learning, thinking, and developing ideas. They shared that the sprint encouraged them to look more closely at real health and care problems, and to turn their observations into practical solutions that could make a meaningful difference.

Dr Rehan Shah and SEMS student co-host workshop on teaching mathematics to large student cohorts at University of Bath

rehan.shah@qmul.ac.uk (Rehan Shah) — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Dr Rehan Shah, in collaboration with Dr Waleed Ali and Dr Samantha Hayward (University of Bath), and SEMS student Ilanthiraiyan Sivagnanamoorthy, hosted a UK-wide one-day in-person workshop at the University of Bath on Friday 5th June 2026, titled 'Teaching mathematics to large student cohorts across HE STEM disciplines' as part of an Interdisciplinary Collaboration grant funded by the London Mathematical Society (LMS) and funding provided through the recently formed 'Cauchy Club' community of practice for mathematics educators set up at Bath.

The workshop consisted of multiple sessions, involving a mix of theoretical discussions during the morning sessions on promoting interactivity through innovative pedagogical techniques used in teaching mathematics led by Dr Waleed Ali (University of Bath) and on leveraging routine homework for non-routine learning through scriptwriting dialogues about mathematical proof led by Prof Igor' Kontorovich (University of Hong Kong).

This was juxtaposed with an engaging, practical, interactive assessment design task during the afternoon session led by Dr Shah and his student Ilan, in which participants engaged in collaborative group work to design skills-oriented multiple-choice questions targeted to specific mathematical proficiencies across a diverse range of mathematics topics and concepts.

The workshop was an overwhelming success and received extremely positive feedback from all of its 25 academic and educator participants, both from within the University of Bath and externally from a diverse range of UK universities.

Feedback from the attendees included the following:

"I just wanted to thank you for organising this event! It was very insightful and informative."
"I can see myself thinking about these things in the future and even now while teaching my undergraduate class!"
"Thank you for giving me the chance to participate in this unique opportunity!"

The insights from the workshop will help inform Dr Shah's large ongoing project focusing on the development of a cross-national mathematical reasoning skills assessment inventory for applied mathematicians and engineers, in collaboration with Dr Alexandra Werth (Cornell University) and will also be disseminated to the wider community in its preparatory stages through internal and external channels.

Multi-institutional Replicability Study sparked by event held at Queen Mary

a.sobrido@qmul.ac.uk (Ana Jorge Sobrido) — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Prof Ana Sobrido's group participated in a multi-institutional replicability study, recently published in Energy & Environmental Science:

"Replicability challenges in redox flow cell testing: Insights from a multi-institutional study"

This study led by Queen's University Belfast included six other institutions: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Cambridge, The University of Manchester, Harvard University, Eindhoven University of Technology and Queen Mary University of London.

This work offers new insights into how laboratory-to-laboratory differences shape electrochemical performance metrics in flow batteries.

Prof Ana Sobrido is extremely pleased that the UK RFB Network Annual Meeting, held at Queen Mary University of London in 2024 and the Royal Society International Exchanges grant which supported the visit of the MIT's team sparked the start of this work.

Prof Ana Sobrido talks to BOSS Energy about barriers to scaling sustainable energy technologies

a.sobrido@qmul.ac.uk (Ana Jorge Sobrido) — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Prof Ana Sobrido was recently interviewed by Francesco Pinci, Marketing Manager at BOSS Energy, to explore the real challenges shaping the future of energy.

One of the strongest insights from the discussion is that the biggest obstacle to scaling sustainable energy globally is not the absence of technology.

According to Professor Ana Jorge Sobrido, the sector already has robust renewable and storage solutions available, particularly in mature markets such as the UK. What has not advanced quickly enough is the surrounding system: grid capacity, permitting processes, and investment frameworks still move more slowly than the technologies they are meant to support.

That distinction matters because it changes the nature of the challenge. The question is no longer simply how to invent better clean technologies, but how to create the policy, infrastructure and financial coordination needed to deploy them at meaningful scale.

From a technical standpoint, Professor Ana Jorge Sobrido, suggests we are relatively close; from a systems standpoint, she believes the full transition will still take another decade or two because alignment across those layers is exceptionally difficult to achieve.

It was an insightful discussion on the challenges that remain and the opportunities ahead as we accelerate the transition to cleaner energy systems.

Hopefully, through collaboration and innovation, we can all play a part in achieving a net-zero future.

From AI and Digital Twins to Clinical Care

t.t.chowdhury@qmul.ac.uk (Tina Chowdhury) — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Call for Abstracts Opens for UK Preterm Birth Conference 2027

Researchers, clinicians, engineers and healthcare professionals are invited to submit abstracts for the UK Preterm Birth Conference hosted by Queen Mary University of London.

The UK Preterm Birth Conference will take place on 18th and 19th January 2027 at Queen Mary University of London's People's Palace in East London, bringing together world-leading experts in maternal, fetal and neonatal health to address one of the most pressing challenges in global healthcare.

The conference is now inviting submissions for oral, flash and poster presentations, providing a platform for researchers and healthcare practitioners to showcase innovative work aimed at improving outcomes for mothers, babies and families affected by preterm birth.

Preterm birth remains one of the leading causes of death among children under five worldwide and contributes significantly to long-term disability and health inequalities. Tackling this complex challenge requires collaboration across disciplines, from clinical medicine and public health to engineering, data science and artificial intelligence.

The conference will feature fifteen themed scientific sessions, four plenary lectures, fifteen keynote speakers, a Tommy’s panel debate on lived experience, an awards ceremony and an international symposium organised in partnership with the Fetal Membrane Society.

Shaping the Future of Maternal and Neonatal Health

Conference themes include:

Prediction & Diagnostics
Prevention Strategies
Neonatal Outcomes
Health & Policy
AI, Digital Twins & Virtual Cities
Translational Research into Clinical Practice

The conference has already announced Sarah Brown, Chair of the Trustees of Theirworld and founder of the Global Maternal Mortality Campaign, as a headline plenary speaker. Further keynote speakers and programme announcements will be released throughout 2026.

Dr Tina Chowdhury, Chair of the UK Preterm Birth Conference Committee and Reader in Regenerative Medicine at Queen Mary University of London, said: “The UK Preterm Birth Conference will bring together clinicians, scientists, engineers, healthcare professionals, policymakers and families to explore innovative solutions for one of the greatest challenges facing maternal and neonatal health. We encourage submissions from across disciplines and career stages, recognising that meaningful progress depends on collaboration, innovation and the translation of research into practice.”

The conference welcomes submissions from:

Researchers and academics
Obstetricians and gynaecologists
Neonatologists and paediatricians
Midwives and nurses
Public health professionals
Engineers and data scientists
Healthcare innovators
Trainees and students
Patient advocacy groups

Abstracts will be peer reviewed and selected for oral, flash or poster presentation. Authors may also apply for the Early Career Researcher Award, recognising outstanding contributions from students, trainees and early career investigators.

Important Dates

Abstract Submission Opens: 1st June 2026
Abstract submitted electronically before 31st July 2026
Conference Programme Announcement: 31st October 2026
UK Preterm Birth Conference 2027: 18th – 19th January 2027
Venue: People's Palace, Queen Mary University of London

About the UK Preterm Birth Conference 2027

The UK Preterm Birth Conference 2027 is a multidisciplinary international meeting hosted by Queen Mary University of London. The conference brings together expertise across medicine, engineering, public health, policy, artificial intelligence and translational science to advance research, innovation and clinical practice aimed at improving outcomes for mothers and babies worldwide.

Another national win for Engineers Without Borders society

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Tue, 02 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Engineers Without Borders (EWB) society Vice President, Rayan Ahmed, reports from their latest win.

A very well deserved congratulations to the EWB Queen Mary University of London team for winning first place at the Engineers Without Borders UK AMplify Impact Challenge 2026, as well as receiving the People’s Prize at #MACH2026!

Once again, EWB QM has delivered on the national stage, showcasing the creativity, technical ability, and dedication of our students. We are incredibly proud to see this continued success and the impact our members are making. Of the top ten finalists selected, two teams were from Queen Mary University of London, further highlighting the strength and depth of talent within our EWB QM community.

This is an outstanding achievement and a true reflection of the hard work and innovation demonstrated throughout the competition. The winning team developed a closed-loop system to recover and reuse dissolved PVA support material in 3D printing, contributing to more sustainable manufacturing practices and demonstrating the real-world impact of engineering solutions. The teams had the opportunity to pitch their work at MACH 2026 at the NEC in Birmingham, presenting in front of industry judges and professionals.

Huge Congratulations to our winning team:
Russell McDonnell, Abdulrahman Mohamud, Zaid Aswat, Krish Kumar and Ayesha Sultana.

As recognition for their outstanding performance, the winning team will also be awarded a tour of the Alpine F1 Factory.

Congratulations to our second team who represented our chapter:
Alisha Asif, Amal Jama, Mishthi Dodwani, Mariya Haque, and Camille Cumlajee.

Finally, congratulations to all the other finalist and winning teams:
2nd place: The University of Sheffield
3rd place: University of Nottingham & The Open University

It is inspiring to see so many students applying engineering to address real sustainability challenges and shape a better future.

A big thank you to Engineers Without Borders UK, Additive Manufacturing UK, the judges, sponsors, and organisers for creating such a valuable opportunity for students across the country.

Sarah Brown to give plenary address at international preterm birth conference

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

UK Preterm Birth Conference 2027 to be hosted at Queen Mary University of London on 18th and 19th January 2027.

Sarah Brown, global health campaigner and Chair of the international children’s charity Theirworld, will give a plenary address with Professor James Boardman, Scientific Director of the Jennifer Brown Research Laboratory, at the UK Preterm Birth Conference 2027 taking place at Queen Mary University of London on 18th and 19th January 2027. The conference will bring together internationally recognised leaders in maternal, fetal and neonatal health for two days of scientific exchange, policy discussion and clinical innovation.

The programme features four plenary talks and fifteen keynote speakers spanning medicine, public health, research, policy, digital health and translational science. It will convene clinicians, scientists, healthcare leaders, policymakers and multidisciplinary experts to examine the latest advances in prediction, prevention and optimisation of care for families affected by preterm birth.

Sarah Brown said, “this is an important time to bring together leaders from different disciplines and backgrounds to address how we can use the rapid progress we are all seeing in medical research, technological innovation and understanding family impact for safer pregnancy and better neonatal health outcomes. The potential for greater breakthroughs will be more significant as we all work together”.

Complications of preterm birth remain one of the leading causes of death among children under five worldwide, according to the World Health Organization, and contribute significantly to long-term childhood disability. The impact on families is profound, creating emotional, societal and economic challenges across every region of the world.

The conference is structured around six major themes shaping the future of preterm birth prevention and care:

Prediction and Diagnostics
Prevention Strategies
Neonatal Outcomes
Health and Policy
AI, Digital Twins and Virtual Cities (the use of artificial intelligence, virtual patient models and city-scale simulation in health research)
Translating Research into Clinical Practice

East London is one of the most diverse and dynamic regions in the world, yet significant health inequalities remain. Opening the conference, Professor Colin Bailey, Principal of Queen Mary University of London, will discuss how partnership across healthcare, research, education, industry and local communities can improve outcomes for families and create lasting impact in maternal and neonatal health.

Professor Colin Bailey CBE, President and Principal at Queen Mary University of London said: “Real progress in reducing health disparities depends on meaningful partnership working across universities, healthcare organisations, communities, education providers and employers. Together, we can help shape a healthier and more equitable future for East London and beyond.”

Professor Catherine Williamson, Centre Director of Tommy’s National Centre for Preterm Birth Research, sponsor of the event said: “Every family affected by preterm birth deserves access to the highest standards of care, support and innovation. By supporting the UK Preterm Birth Conference 2027, Tommy’s is helping to strengthen international collaboration and accelerate progress in maternal and neonatal health research and care.”

Dr Tina Chowdhury, Chair of the UK Preterm Birth Conference Organising Committee said: “World-leading experts are uniting to reduce the burden of preterm birth through scientific excellence, international collaboration and innovation-driven healthcare solutions.”

The programme includes multidisciplinary lectures, plenary discussions, scientific presentations and training workshops addressing the future of maternal-fetal medicine and neonatal care in an increasingly digital and data-driven landscape.

Students visit Queen Mary Engineering School in Xi'an, China

a.wilkes@qmul.ac.uk (Ayden Wilkes) — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Design Engineering student, Nicole Kirk reports from the cultural exchange trip to China.

Six Queen Mary University of London engineering students recently travelled to Xi'an, China, as part of the university's partnership with Northwestern Polytechnical University (NPU) home to the Queen Mary University of London Engineering School (QMES). The students, drawn from a range of engineering disciplines, were formally selected and invited to represent Queen Mary on the international visit, with the university fully sponsoring their participation throughout the duration of the programme.

The six students who made the trip were Christo Damai, Nicole Kirk, Janush Ramesh, Alina Shah, Mehmet Sezgin, and Rayan Amjad, each bringing their own disciplinary backgrounds of aerospace, design, robotics, mechanical and chemical engineering.

The visit offered students the opportunity to tour NPU's campus, attend academic lectures alongside QMES students, experiencing first-hand the academic environment that has emerged from the collaboration between the two institutions. The students participated in cultural activities including:

cycling the city's ancient walls
Beijing opera face painting
eating local noodles
visiting the Muslim quarters dating back over 1300 years.

Among the group Nicole Kirk reflected on how the trip had exceeded all expectations:

"I had no idea this opportunity existed when I applied to Queen Mary, and that makes it all the more special. A fully-funded trip to the other side of the world, experiencing a completely different culture while connecting with fellow engineers from across the globe, really speaks to Queen Mary's vision of producing engineers who think and operate on an international scale. We have built great friendships with the QMES students in China and we absolutely cannot wait to return the hospitality and show them everything London has to offer when they visit us this summer”

Engineering students present scholarship research with Dr Rehan Shah and team at SEDA Conference

rehan.shah@qmul.ac.uk (Rehan Shah) — Mon, 25 May 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Maneeha Siddiki and Leonie Faulker, second-year design engineering undergraduate students, along with Dr Rehan Shah, and a cross-institutional team of multi-disciplinary colleagues comprising Dr Matthew Cole (Hartpury University) and Dr Noleen Chikowore (University of Leeds) presented their collaborative scholarship research project "AI in Academia': Auditing educational developers' use of and attitude towards GenAI in HE and FE" at the SEDA Spring Conference held at Liverpool John Moores University on Friday 22nd May 2026.

The project, funded by a SEDA (Staff and Educational Development Association) Research and Evaluation Grant focuses on auditing educational developers across multiple UK institutions to shape future AI guidance and contribute to ongoing research by leveraging a diverse team across multiple institutions, both within the HE and FE sectors. It specifically aims to explore how AI is currently used in practice by educational developers, what their attitudes towards AI integration in education are and what the existing gaps in their knowledge, competence, and confidence of AI use are.

The study employed a multi-phase, iterative approach to review existing literature to scope AI applications in educational development, surveyed educator staff to audit AI usage across multiple UK HE and FE institutions and conduct multiple rounds of cross-institutional staff focus groups to gather qualitative insights on attitudes and behaviours towards AI use for teaching and learning practices. Key outputs of the project include creation of open-access infographics to be showcased through the SEDA online blog and magazine, a research paper for SEDA's flagship Innovations in Education and Teaching International journal, in addition to dissemination at institutional conferences such as the upcoming QMUL Festival of Education in June 2026.

Dr Deepshikha selected for inaugural Google Higher Education Faculty AI Fellowship for EMEA

d.deepshikha@qmul.ac.uk (Deepshikha Deepshikha) — Sun, 24 May 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Dr Deepshikha from the School of Engineering and Materials Science at Queen Mary University of London has been selected for the inaugural Google Higher Education Faculty AI Fellowship for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA).

The Fellowship, launched in 2026, was awarded following a highly competitive selection process. According to Google for Education, the inaugural cohort was selected from "some of the most forward-thinking minds in academia globally," with successful applicants chosen because they "don't just see the potential of AI, they see the responsibility that comes with it."

Dr Deepshikha’s selection recognises her leadership in responsible AI-enabled assessment and feedback, particularly through her work on EduMark AI, an educator-controlled platform designed to support rubric-based marking, personalised feedback and human-in-the-loop academic judgement. Her work aligns closely with Queen Mary’s strategic priorities around educational innovation, digital transformation and inclusive student success.

The Google Higher Education Faculty AI Fellowship is designed to move participants beyond functional use of AI tools towards strategic leadership. Through the programme, Fellows will refine an institutional "Impact Challenge" and explore how AI can be used not only to improve local practice but also to create scalable solutions for higher education globally.

Dr Deepshikha said:

“I am honoured to be selected as part of the inaugural Google Higher Education Faculty AI Fellowship for EMEA. This is an exciting opportunity to contribute to international conversations on how AI can be used responsibly and meaningfully in higher education. My work focuses on ensuring that AI supports, rather than replaces, academic judgement, while improving feedback quality, assessment literacy and student confidence. I am particularly looking forward to working with colleagues across the EMEA region to explore scalable, ethical and student-centred approaches to AI in assessment and learning.”

The fellowship comes at a significant time for higher education, as universities move from experimental AI use towards more integrated approaches to governance, curriculum design, assessment and student support. With students increasingly using AI as part of their learning processes, institutions are being challenged to move beyond detection-based responses and towards models that support AI literacy, academic integrity and authentic learning.

Dr Deepshikha's selection further strengthens Queen Mary's growing national and international profile in AI-enhanced learning, teaching, and assessment.

The first cohort's work will be developed through a series of sessions across 2026, culminating in the in-person Institute at Google London.

Queen Mary Impact Fund awarded to Dr Deepshikha and Team to advance responsible AI-enabled assessment

d.deepshikha@qmul.ac.uk (Deepshikha Deepshikha) — Sun, 24 May 2026 23:00:00 +0100

EduMark AI has secured a £9,000 Queen Mary Impact Fund award for the project, “EduMark AI: Advancing Responsible AI-Enabled Assessment Through Pilot Readiness and Sector Adoption.”

The Queen Mary Impact Fund is a highly competitive internal funding scheme that supports projects with strong potential to translate research, innovation and knowledge exchange into meaningful real-world impact. This award recognises the strength of EduMark AI as a responsible, scalable and sector-relevant educational innovation.

EduMark AI is an educator-led artificial intelligence platform designed to improve the efficiency, consistency and quality of assessment and feedback while keeping human academic judgement at the centre. The platform provides rubric-aligned, personalised and timely feedback under educator oversight, helping to address growing challenges around marking workload, feedback quality and assessment scalability in higher education.

The project team includes Dr Deepshikha as Lead Applicant, with Dr Riasat Islam from the School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) and Dr Giuseppe Viola from the School of Engineering and Materials Science (SEMS) as co-applicants. The funded project will support the next stage of EduMark AI’s development, focusing on pilot readiness, institutional implementation and sector adoption. The work will include strengthening the platform for wider use, supporting integration with institutional assessment workflows, building further evidence for evaluation, and identifying potential early-adopter institutions.

Speaking about the award, Dr Deepshikha said:

“I am delighted to receive the Queen Mary Impact Fund award for EduMark AI. This is a highly competitive and significant funding route, so this recognition is an important milestone for the project and the wider team. EduMark AI aims to support educators and students through responsible, transparent and human-centred use of AI in assessment and feedback. I am excited to continue developing the project in alignment with Queen Mary’s commitment to innovation, inclusion and educational excellence.”

The award will enable EduMark AI to move from educational innovation towards broader institutional and sector impact. By supporting pilot readiness, evaluation and adoption planning, the project will help position Queen Mary as a leader in responsible AI-enabled assessment and feedback.

Scientists generate electricity from ambient moisture using everyday ingredients

d.papageorgiou@qmul.ac.uk (Dimitrios Papageorgiou) — Wed, 20 May 2026 23:00:00 +0100

An international research team led by scientists at Queen Mary University of London has developed an innovative method to power wearable electronics using ambient moisture and simple, non-toxic materials commonly found in the kitchen.

In a study published in Nano Energy, researchers from Queen Mary, the University of Warwick, Imperial College London, and Universitas Mercatorum report a highly stable, biodegradable Moisture-Electric Generator (MEG). The device is fabricated from food-grade materials including gelatin, sodium chloride (table salt), and activated carbon, and harnesses humidity, typically a major challenge for electronics, as its energy source.

This approach represents a significant shift in electronic design, transforming atmospheric moisture from a limitation into a functional energy input.

A Sustainable Alternative to Conventional Power Sources

With global electronic waste (e-waste) continuing to rise, the development offers a potentially low-impact alternative to conventional batteries and energy systems. The MEG is manufactured using a simple, water-based process and relies on widely available, non-toxic materials, supporting more sustainable and circular approaches to electronics.

The technology works by absorbing water molecules from the surrounding air or from human skin. As the gelatin-salt solution dries, it self-organises into a three-layered structure. When exposed to humidity, this architecture enables ion movement within the material, generating a continuous and stable electrical output of approximately 1 volt per unit for periods exceeding 30 days.

By connecting multiple units in series, the research team demonstrated scaled performance of up to 90 volts and 5.08 mA, sufficient to power small electronic devices such as a 40-light LED string.

Dr Ming Dong, Postdoctoral Research Associate at Queen Mary University of London’s School of Engineering and Materials Science and first author of the study, said:

“Generating high voltages typically requires complex manufacturing processes or scarce materials. This work shows that it is possible to achieve strong performance using simple, sustainable components. By combining gelatin and salt, we have created a generator that operates using ambient humidity as its sole energy source.”

Dual Function: Power Generation and Sensing

In addition to energy harvesting, the material demonstrates potential as a sensitive, skin-compatible sensor. Because its electrical output responds to small changes in moisture, the system can detect physiological signals linked to humidity variations.

The researchers demonstrated that the device can monitor breathing patterns in real time and detect changes associated with speech through variations in exhaled moisture. It also shows promise for touchless proximity sensing, opening opportunities for integration into wearable health monitoring systems and human–machine interfaces, without requiring a battery.

Biodegradable by Design

A key advantage of the technology is its environmentally benign end-of-life profile. Unlike conventional electronics that rely on plastics and heavy metals, the MEG is designed to degrade safely.

After use, the device can either biodegrade in soil within a few weeks or be dissolved in water, enabling recovery and reuse of its components without hazardous chemicals. This positions the technology as a potential contributor to circular electronics, where materials can be safely returned to the environment or recycled.

Dr Dimitrios Papageorgiou, Reader in Functional Polymers and Composites at Queen Mary and corresponding author of the study, said:

“Our goal was to rethink how electronic materials are designed and manufactured. This research demonstrates that high-performance energy devices can be made from low-cost, environmentally friendly materials. The ability of a gelatin-based system to generate meaningful electrical output highlights the potential scalability of this approach.”

The open-access paper, titled "A biobased moisture-electric generator with self-stratified architecture for physiological sensing and energy harvesting," was published in Nano Energy on 19 May 2026.

Full Journal Citation: Dong, M., Zhang, H., Bilotti, E., Cataldi, P., & Papageorgiou, D. G. (2026). A biobased moisture-electric generator with self-stratified architecture for physiological sensing and energy harvesting. Nano Energy, 155, 112040.

Queen Mary welcomes Professor Peter Collins and students from Iowa State University

c.panwisawas@qmul.ac.uk (Chinnapat Panwisawas) — Tue, 19 May 2026 23:00:00 +0100

Dr Chinnapat Panwisawas and his research group members have welcomed Professor Peter Collins, Stanley Chair in Interdisciplinary Engineering and Professor, the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Iowa State University, USA who had led the 12 undergraduate students at Iowa State to visit Queen Mary on Tuesday, 19th May 2026.

Professor Collins delivered a seminar on 'Progress in Additively Manufactured Gradient Materials: Predicting, Making, and Qualifying'. His research interests involve: physical metallurgy; advanced characterisation techniques; quantification of defects and crystal orientation across length scales; advanced materials processing with special interest in additive manufacturing; and the mechanical behaviour of non-ferrous materials, including establishing composition-microstructure property relationships. He has conducted basic and applied research on metal-based additive manufacturing for over 20 years, emphasising qualification strategies and gradient materials. He has received multiple awards for teaching and his research, and has ~100 publications, 50+ invited talks, multiple US patents, and most recently has joined as co-author of the 14th edition of the textbook 'DeGarmo’s Materials and Processes in Manufacturing'.

His talk described how multiple gradients could be achieved, and some technical advances in the modelling associated with achieving sufficiently precise gradients. To develop the predictive tools necessary for design engineers to incorporate spatially varying properties, he greatly presented an effort to predict the processing-materials state-properties-performance relationships in Ti-based gradient structures where both composition and aging temperatures are spatially controlled. He presented a new concept of feasibility diagrams for processing to feasibility diagrams of inspectability to complimenting qualification (including post-manufacture nondestructive evaluation (NDE)).

Dr Panwisawas has started some initial research discussion and collaboration in the gradient materials with Professor Collins to jointly develop research programmes in the near future.