Susan Perkin is Professor of Physical Chemistry and Fellow of Trinity College, University of Oxford. She earned her DPhil in 2006, working both in Oxford and at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel, and with a Jowett Senior Scholarship from Balliol College, Oxford. She was also a Junior Research Fellow at Merton College from 2005-2008. She moved to UCL in London (2007-2012, as RCUK Fellow then Lecturer) where she set up a laboratory and research group to work on ionic liquids and liquid interfaces. In 2012 she was appointed to a faculty position in the Physical & Theoretical Chemistry Laboratory, University of Oxford, and in 2019 awarded the title of (full) Professor. Current interests include electrostatics in concentrated electrolytes and ionic liquids, electrolytes in confined geometry, molecular mechanisms of friction and lubrication, field effects on confined liquids, and controlling surface forces. In the past several years Susan has been awarded a Starting Grant from the ERC (2015), the Harrison-Meldola Memorial Prize (2016) from the Royal Society of Chemistry, a Philip Leverhulme Prize (2016) from The Leverhulme Trust, the Soft Matter Lectureship (2018) from the journal Soft Matter, a Consolidator Grant from the ERC (2021). In 2023 Susan has been named as Chemistry Laureate at the Blavatnik Awards for young scientists in the UK, administered by the New York Academy of Sciences. Susan serves as member (2013-) and co-chair (2020-) of the Royal Society's Research Grants Board (Physical Sciences), member (2018-) and chair (2021-) of the RSC Faraday Standing Committee on Conferences (editorial board of the Faraday Discussions), member of the Liquid Matter Board of the European Physical Society, and member of the Royal Society Newton International Fellowships committee. She serves on the Editorial Advisory Boards of Soft Matter (RSC) and Journal of Chemical Physics (AIP).
