Centre for Plant Science & Bio-polymer Research

Led by Professor Philip Turner, the Centre for Plant Science and Bio-polymer research has two key focus areas:

• Fundamental and strategic research to develop new understanding of the key factors/drivers impacting on the structure and biopolymer composition of plants/trees at all scales. This ranges from the sub-atomic level, through the nano-scale structure of the cell wall, right to the whole plant. An important part of our research is targeted at characterising different cell wall components and how they interact.
• Develop methods to extract, separate, refine and process cell wall components into new, high value, bio-polymer based materials.

Much of our research is carried out in collaboration with a number of leading UK universities (including Cambridge, Manchester. St Andrews, Leeds & Oxford).  The work integrates fundamental research in fields as diverse as:

• physics
• chemistry
• molecular biology
• genetics
• materials science and
• analytical chemistry.

Our work is revealing important new insights into the nano-scale structure of the plant cell wall and what drives it.

More information

Please contact:
Professor Philip Turner BSc, MSc, PhD, FIWSc
0131 455 2250

ph.turner@napier.ac.uk

Professor Rob English. BSc PhD

07966 048086

r.english@napier.ac.uk