Sylvia Draper

TCD

Professor Sylvia Draper graduated in Chemistry from the University of Exeter (1:1) in 1988. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge in 1991 (working with Dr. C. Housecroft on 'Boron Butterfly Clusters') and joined Trinity after a short PD fellowship with Professor D. Cardin. She is Professor of Molecular Materials (2019) and Dean of the Faculty of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. In this senior management role Sylvia leads-out on the College’s E3 Initiative: a project at scale that sets out to put sustainability at the forefront of multi-disciplinary teaching and research in STEM. 

An active researcher and a founding member of CRANN, Sylvia’s research has attracted funding from Science Foundation Ireland (SFI), the Irish Research Council (IRC), Enterprise Ireland (EI) and EU FP7 MC-TOK funding. Her work focuses on the synthesis and application of emissive molecular systems formed at the interface of organic and coordination chemistry. Her novel opto-electronic materials span from N-doped molecular graphenes to triplet photosensitisers and find broad application in upconversion processes, photodynamic therapy and photopolymerisation. 

Sylvia was the first Trinity recipient of both a Provost Teaching Award and a National Award for the Integration of Research Teaching and Learning (NAIRTL). She was elected to chair the Royal Society of Chemistry’s Irish local Section (representing 1000+ members, 2019), to become a member of the European Academy of Sciences (2022) and is the Irish national IUPAC representative (sitting on the Interdivisional Committee on Green Chemistry for Sustainable Development (2022)). She has been an advocate for action on gender, equality and diversity throughout her career.