The DPI Golden Thesis Award for 2018 has been granted to Dr. Dirk Jan Mulder in recognition of his excellent research as published in the thesis Adjustable nanoporous polymers based on smectic liquid crystals. Dr. Mulder defended his thesis successfully in October 2017 at the Eindhoven University of Technology (Netherlands). The research described in the thesis formed part of the research programme of DPI and was conducted under the supervision of Prof. Albert Schenning, head of the Stimuli-responsive Functional Materials & Devices Research Group at the same university.

The Golden Thesis Award is granted every two years for the best PhD thesis resulting from DPI-funded research. Dirk Jan Mulder was declared the winner from among the three finalists competing for this year’s award. The other two candidates were: Hans van Franeker (Eindhoven University of Technology), with a thesis titled Droplets, fibers & crystals: controlling the nanostructure of polymer and perovskite solar cells, and Monica Zakhari (Eindhoven University of Technology) with a thesis titled Microscale simulations of the mechanics of spongy-particle systems. The award was presented during the plenary session of the DPI Annual Meeting 2018 in Eindhoven on 13 November.

The three contenders had been selected from the seven nominations received this year. During the plenary session, each of them gave short presentations describing their PhD research in the presence of the Award Committee comprising Prof. Dick Broer (Eindhoven University of Technology, chair), Prof. Costantino Creton (ESPCI Paris) and Prof. Thijs Michels (emeritus professor Eindhoven University of Technology and Former Scientific Director of DPI). The committee judged the candidates on four criteria: scientific quality and originality, relevance and societal impact, presentation, and embedding within DPI.

While praising the excellent quality of the work of all three researchers, the award Committee was unanimous in its choice of the winner: “The research work of Dirk Jan Mulder has led to a completely new class of polymers.” The newly developed nanoporous polymers, with a new pore chemistry, open up an entirely new class of nanoporous materials with unprecedented properties. The thesis illustrates the possibilities and advantages of using smectic liquid crystalline polymer networks for the fabrication of nanoporous materials. The large surface area to volume ratio of the materials makes them interesting for applications such as filtration, separation, adsorption, catalysis, and ion conduction. The research also looked into the application of the nanoporous materials as membranes. Dirk Jan Mulder: “It would be great if the findings I have reported could be translated into new membrane technology. Using concepts and techniques well known in the field of displays, the work described in my thesis could lead to new developments.”

Dirk Jan Mulder was delighted with this recognition for his work. “I am grateful to Professor Schenning for encouraging me to undertake this research a few years ago and for nominating me for the DPI Golden Thesis Award this year.”

Dr. Mulder is currently working at Rolic Technologies (a subsidiary of BASF) in Switzerland and is based near Basel. At Rolic he is among other things working on the development of optical films for e.g. display applications. His responsibilities further include identifying and translating industry needs into innovative solutions.

Source: https://www.polymers.nl/news/dpi-annual-meeting-2018-1