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Prof. Małgorzata (Gosia) Swadźba-Kwaśny is a Professor of Inorganic Chemistry and the Director of the QUILL Research Centre at the School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Queen’s University Belfast.
She obtained her MSc (2005) from the Silesian University of Technology, Poland (Chrobok group), and her PhD (2009) from the QUILL Research Centre at Queen’s University Belfast (Seddon group). Her doctoral and post-doctoral projects included collaborations with several industrial partners, including Petronas, BP and Evonik. In 2015, Gosia has secured Queen’s University Fellowship and established her own research group. Sha was promoted to Senior Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in 2019 and to Full Professor in 2021.
Gosia’s research focuses on ionic liquids and other advanced liquid materials. Her group studies various aspects of fundamental properties of liquids, including phase transitions and thermal stability, Brønsted and Lewis acidity and metal speciation in the liquid phase. They design and synthesise acidic and metal-containing ionic liquids, drawing on advances in main-group chemistry, with particular emphasis on Group 13 elements. They investigate the molecular-level structure and reactivity of liquids using a combination of in-house spectroscopic and scattering techniques alongside synchrotron-based methods, including X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) and total neutron scattering (TNS).
In parallel, Gosia has an extensive experience in applied research projects in collaboration with industrial partners such as PETRONAS, The LYCRA Company, Chevron and Ionic Technologies. These projects explore the use of ionic liquids and other functional liquids as more sustainable alternatives to conventional catalysts and solvents. Applications include acidic ionic liquids as catalysts for the valorisation of plastic waste streams, precursors for semiconductor materials synthesis, and additives in formulations for technological fluids.
Gosia is a Member of the Royal Society of Chemistry. She has a long-standing collaboration with the ISIS Neutron and Muon Source, having served as Facility Access Panel Member and subsequently Chair, and representing the Disordered Materials community at ISIS User Meetings. She serves as a member of the Editorial Board for IOP Sustainability Science and Technology.
Further links:
Swadźba-Kwaśny Lab 