Professor Lee Cronin

‌Regius Chair of Chemistry

‘We are leading exciting research investigating how chemistry can revolutionize modern technology, be developed using artificial intelligence, and even create life.’

Professor Lee Cronin leads cutting-edge research into how complex chemical systems, created from non-biological building blocks, can have real-world applications with wide impact.

A professor of chemistry, nanoscience and chemical complexity, Lee Cronin and his research group focus on understanding and controlling self-assembly and self-organisation in Chemistry to develop functional and nano-molecular chemical systems. They are developing a range of new chemical robotic systems for discovery and manufacture of chemicals working towards the ‘digital chemistry’ revolution. This will use robotics, artificial intelligence, and new approaches to decision making for chemical discovery.

One target is the development of ‘inorganic biology’ i.e. a biological system beyond the naturally occurring ‘organic biology’ found on planet earth. Not only does this have ramifications for the origin of life on earth, elsewhere in the universe, the realisation of a living system assembled from the bottom up would also lead to a range of new technologies. To achieve his aims, Cronin and his group regularly collaborate with Physical, Theoretical, Organic, Materials, and Biological Chemists as well as Scientists in Chemical and Electrical Engineering, Mathematics, Physics and Medicine.

Find out more about Professor Cronin.

Professor Cronin's research focusses on the potential of complex chemical systems derived from non-biological building blocks to have a major impact on our fundamental understanding of the interplay of chemical systems and to revolutionise modern technologies by using artificial intelligence in chemistry.