Dr James Wilton-Ely joined Imperial in 2009 after being a member of staff at the University of Oxford and UCL. He has extensive experience in coordination and organometallic chemistry of metals from groups 8-11 and their use in catalysis.

Catalysis/Sustainability and Applied Inorganics

Current research focuses on multimetallic assemblies and the immobilisation of metal units on gold nanoparticles. These materials address applications in catalysis, bioimaging (targeted MRI contrast agents) and sensing (carbon monoxide). The research into nanoscale materials extends also to functionalised thiols for the preparation of Self Assembly Monolayers (with Prof. Manfred Buck, St. Andrews). Most recently, the dissolution of biomass in ionic liquids and subsequent conversion into platform chemicals has become the focus of a joint project with Dr Jason Hallett (Imperial College).

Cecchini MP, Turek VA, Demetriadou A, et al., 2014, Heavy Metal Sensing Using Self-Assembled Nanoparticles at a Liquid-Liquid Interface, Advanced Optical Materials, Vol:2, ISSN:2195-1071, Pages:966-977 Moragues ME, Toscani A, Sancenon F, et al., 2014, A Chromo-Fluorogenic Synthetic "Canary" for CO Detection Based on a Pyrenylvinyl Ruthenium(II) Complex, Journal of the American Chemical Society, Vol:136, ISSN:0002-7863, Pages:11930-11933 DOIAuthor Web LinkOpen Access Link

Naeem S, Serapian SA, Toscani A, et al., 2014, Ring-Closing Metathesis and Nanoparticle Formation Based on Diallyldithiocarbamate Complexes of Gold(I): Synthetic, Structural, and Computational Studies, Inorganic Chemistry, Vol:53, ISSN:0020-1669, Pages:2404-2416