I am a materials scientist who applies fundamental physics to understand and predict the structure and properties of materials of technological significance. Thus, my interests are at the interface between condensed matter physics and materials science. My work requires a good grasp of theory spanning classical and quantum mechanics, elastic field theory of defects and their interactions in solids, transport of atoms, electrons and heat in solids, thermodynamics and statistical mechanics, electronic structure and interatomic forces. Using this broad theoretical background, and my knowledge of significant open questions in materials science, I have frequently developed new concepts for materials and undertaken pioneering simulations of materials at the atomic and microstructural levels, which have made a lasting impact.

            Although my research is theoretical and computational in nature I have always been attracted to problems that have some experimental and/or engineering significance. I relish the challenge of breaking into areas of materials science where there has been no theory or simulation before, and this explains the unusual breadth of my research, and its problem-driven rather than technique-driven nature, spanning as it does metals and alloys, ceramics, semiconductors, polymers and composites, functional and mechanical properties. The problems I choose usually involve the atomic and molecular length scales, but the influence of atomic scale processes and mechanisms on the evolution of microstructure has also been a theme of my research over the past decade or so. I am one of the most highly cited materials scientists worldwide. My contributions to materials science were recognised in 2003 through my election to a Fellowship of the Royal Society.