Dr Philip Craven

• Fellow of the Higher Education Authority
• PhD in Organic Chemistry, University of York, 2013
• MChem with Industrial Experience, University of Edinburgh, 2009

Philip graduated in 2009 from the University of Edinburgh with a MChem (Hons) First Class degree in Chemistry with Industrial Experience. During his degree he took a year in industry working for the Drug Discovery arm of GSK Stevenage.

Upon completion of his Masters degree, Philip moved to the University of York to carry out his PhD studies under the supervision of Professor Richard Taylor. He worked on the total synthesis of a range of natural products that exhibited exciting activity against malignant pleural mesothelioma, an aggressive form of lung cancer.

After completion of his PhD, he undertook a brief post-doctoral project with Professor Iain Coldham at the University of Sheffield working on the development of fluorinated drug analogues for PET imaging. In April 2013, he moved to the University of Leeds where we undertook a post-doctoral role in Professor Adam Nelson's group. Whilst at Leeds, he worked on a range of projects but primarily focussed on the development of novel synthetic strategies to access biologically relevant chemical space.

He moved to the University of Birmingham in November 2016, to take up a teaching fellow role.

As Director of Undergraduate Teaching Labs for the School of Chemistry, Phil organises the lab courses across the first three years of the degree programmes. The focus of these courses is to prepare students to develop into competent and confident lab chemists. He is currently redesigning all aspects of the lab course to make best use of the fantastic opportunities made available by the brand new Collaborative Teaching Laboratory (CTL). He also teaches Spectroscopy courses for both Year 1 and 2 and Enolate chemistry for Year 2. 

Outside of the School, Phil chairs the Innovation Group within the CTL, encouraging innovative teaching practices across STEM education, and interacts with HEFi through the Beacon programme as both a mentor and assessor.