Materials Science Jobs

• Stockton-on-Tees
• On-site
• £34,500 – £46,500 pa
• Senior
• Permanent

Lead technical delivery of small to medium process chemistry projects, designing and scaling polymerisation reactions from lab to pilot scale. Act as a technical specialist in acrylic and vinyl monomer chemistry, running hazard reviews and process safety work while mentoring junior scientists in a collaborative R&D team.

• Harlow
• On-site
• Senior

Lead technical workstreams in R&D, designing and interpreting experimental programmes to develop polymer products, formulations and applications. Oversee laboratory, pilot plant and manufacturing trials, supporting scale-up, technology transfer and new product launches while troubleshooting production runs alongside manufacturing, commercial and regulatory teams.

• Harlow
• Entry level

Two-year graduate programme within the Research and Development function, rotating through four six-month placements covering synthesis, applications and analytical science. Involves designing and running laboratory experiments, analysing scientific and commercial data, and presenting recommendations to stakeholders while contributing to new products and intellectual property.

• London
• Hybrid · 3 days in office
• Mid-level
• Permanent

Owns a set of partner labs and their integration onto an AI materials-discovery platform, translating experimental workflows, instruments and LIMS/ELN data into engineering requirements. Leads technical discovery and onboarding through to first closed-loop campaigns, and works with ML researchers on Bayesian optimisation campaigns that respect real lab constraints.

Python · LIMS · ELN +3

• Sheffield
• Hybrid
• £39,560 – £41,885 pa
• Entry level
• Contract

Develops explainable machine learning models such as symbolic regression, Bayesian optimisation and genetic algorithms to decode polymer-solvent thermodynamics and soft-matter physics. Involves featurizing complex polymer architectures, analysing multi-modal experimental datasets, and building open-source cheminformatics tools in Python/Julia for sustainable inverse formulation design.

Python · Julia · C++ +1

• London
• £52,790 – £73,271 pa
• Senior
• Permanent

Deliver undergraduate materials and polymer science education for a joint UK-China engineering school, with a focus on curriculum development, novel pedagogies and inclusive teaching. The post is based in London but involves extensive travel to Xi'an, China for substantial periods, supporting transnational education programmes.

• Shildon
• £47,000 – £59,000 pa
• Senior

Hands-on formulation role developing, testing and optimising chemical formulations for advanced materials and surface technologies, then scaling them from lab batches through pilot trials to full production. Involves lab experimentation, physical and performance testing, root cause analysis and close work with production and engineering teams on scale-up, raw material selection and new product introduction.

• Bath
• £38,784 – £46,049 pa
• Entry level
• Contract

Postdoctoral role designing and investigating highly selective, robust catalysts for ring-opening, ring-expansion and polycondensation of renewable monomers to create sustainable plastics with controlled architectures. Involves anaerobic Schlenk line and glove box work plus polymer characterisation by spectroscopy, GPC, DSC, TGA and tensile testing, within the SCHEMA Hub's cross-university and industrial network.

GPC · DSC · TGA +3

• Oxford
• £21,805 pa
• Entry level
• Contract

Develops a mesoscale modelling framework to predict time-dependent deformation and failure of polymer networks, using coarse-grained discrete-network models and statistical mechanics. Focuses on viscoelasticity and chain scission, validated against experimental data and molecular simulations within the Brassart Group.

MATLAB · Python · C/C++

• Scunthorpe
• £40,000 – £45,000 pa
• Mid-level · manages people

Lead a manufacturing team in Scunthorpe, optimising PVC extrusion and polymer processing operations. Responsibilities include coordinating extrusion trials, managing critical spares and preventative maintenance, analysing process data, and driving scrap reduction and line efficiency improvements while liaising with suppliers on new materials and tooling.

• Norwich
• £20,409 pa
• Entry level
• Contract

Develop and apply advanced NMR methods to determine the chain length and aggregation state of natural polymers, including seaweed-derived materials from an industrial partner. The work spans experimental and pulse sequence design, mathematical modelling of Brownian motion and diffusion, and complementary techniques such as dynamic light scattering and chromatography, in collaboration with the University of Manchester.

NMR · Size-Exclusion Chromatography · Dynamic Light Scattering +1

• Oxford
• On-site
• £21,805 pa
• Entry level
• Contract

A DPhil studentship in polymerisation catalysis focused on catalyst innovation for CO2 copolymerisation, involving organic ligand synthesis, inorganic catalyst preparation and characterisation (NMR, MS, XRD), polymerisation testing and materials analysis. Based in the Chemical Research Laboratory, Oxford, under Professor Charlotte Williams, with work spanning structure-performance relationships across the polymer lifecycle.

NMR · Mass Spectrometry · XRD

• Manchester
• £21,805 pa
• Entry level
• Contract

Four-year PhD studentship developing chemically defined amphiphilic polymers to extract and stabilise membrane proteins, especially ion channels, into native-like nanodiscs. The student will synthesise polymer libraries using automated synthesis, characterise them by NMR and size-exclusion chromatography, and screen for membrane interaction and nanodisc formation to build structure–activity relationships.

Automated Polymer Synthesis · NMR Spectroscopy · Size-Exclusion Chromatography

• Swansea
• £21,805 pa
• Entry level
• Contract

Develops next-generation microporous membranes for low-cost, long-duration iron–sulfur redox flow batteries, designing and synthesising functional polymers of intrinsic microporosity with tailored sub-nanometre pores. Involves membrane characterisation, electrochemical testing and structure–ion transport–performance studies, with an industrial placement at Leaf-Tech Ltd on scale-up and manufacturing.

Polymers of Intrinsic Microporosity

• London
• Director · manages people

Leads the global Procurement PMO and governance framework, driving a value creation programme across roughly £1.7bn of spend with over 60 initiative owners. Partners with the VP Group Procurement and executive stakeholders on strategy, transformation, risk, budget and executive reporting, including the five-year roadmap.

Excel · Power BI · Source-to-Pay +1