Congratulations to Rohan Fidell (pictured on the left during his time at Queen’s) , OQ 2021, who will embark on a DPhil at Wadham College, Oxford later this year. We chatted with Rohan to find out more.

At Queen’s, Rohan achieved A*s in Chemistry, Physics, Maths and Further Maths at A level. His time at school – and beyond – was hugely influenced by several of his teachers, including:

“Mr Hamilton, who was my tutor for most of my time at Queen’s. He was always very encouraging and incredibly helpful. Mrs Pawley taught me the value of pushing myself to achieve where answers aren’t immediately obvious or easy to find, which I feel has served me well throughout my degree. Dr Haggerston was very helpful with interview preparation, and gave me the opportunity to tackle problems in physics which extended beyond the normal A level curriculum. The skills I developed doing this were really helpful when I started tackling more difficult concepts in my degree.”

After Queen’s Rohan went on to Lancaster University for an integrated Mater’s degree in Natural Sciences, which enabled him to combine all of his A level subjects in one course. But he quickly realised that he preferred Chemistry at University level, and focused the majority of his degree on that. He was the highest scoring student on his course in his second and third years.

Many of us will know about LEDs and their application in day to day life – for example television screens and computer monitors. But OLEDs  (organic light-emitting diodes) offer superior contrast ratios, colour accuracy and response times – but first there are a number of unsolved problems to tackle before they can be reliably used.  This will be the focus of Rohan’s research.

“OLEDs have the potential to be more energy-efficient than LEDs. As a result, these materials are attractive from both a financial and environmental perspective. However, there are a number of unsolved problems associated with OLEDs, such as their shorter lifespans, relatively broad emission spectra and the difficulty of accessing near-ultraviolet and near-infrared wavelengths of light. My DPhil will focus on addressing some of these problems.”