Postdoctoral Fellow, School of Chemical Engineering
What is your research background and current field of research?
I’m a Marie Skłodowska-Curie postdoctoral fellow in the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences (EPS). My research focuses on single-atom and low-dimensional nanomaterial catalysts at the intersection of electrocatalysis, Power-to-X and sustainable chemical processes. I work across green hydrogen and circular-chemistry reactions (including plastic upcycling, biomass upgrading, methanol oxidation and hydrogen peroxide synthesis), and electrode materials for electrochemical energy storage. Recently, I’ve been developing AI-enabled, data-driven approaches for net zero that accelerate catalyst discovery and optimisation.
Which BEAR Services have been most helpful to you in your research?
BEAR’s training programme has been particularly valuable for me. With their support, I’ve completed a range of courses spanning MATLAB, Linux and Python, as well as NVIDIA training at multiple levels, and I’ve also joined relevant interest groups. Beyond training, BlueBEAR’s high-performance computing (HPC) platform has been essential for my work, especially for calculations and modelling that probe atomic-scale interactions and electronic structure. Going forward, I also plan to make increasing use of BEAR’s data management and storage services to support robust, reproducible research workflows.
How widespread do you think BEAR Services are known in your School and how do you plan to spread the word?
In my School, awareness is quite good among colleagues already doing computational work, but lower among experimental researchers who could still benefit (e.g., data handling, automation and analysis). I plan to share short, practical cases in group meetings, point colleagues to the most relevant BEAR training and documentation, and encourage new starters and students to get started early with BEAR services.
How can researchers in your School/College contact you?
Email: x.han.3@bham.ac.uk
Teams: You can also reach me on Microsoft Teams via my UoB email address.
What's an interesting fact about you?
Outside the lab, I enjoy making one-page summaries and visual notes. I’m always trying to turn messy ideas into something clear and structured. I’m also a keen swimmer and table tennis player, and I love cooking; I enjoy experimenting with recipes and iterating on them much like I do with research workflows.