Surface Innovations - meet the new EiC!

I am Professor Neil Shirtcliffe and I am taking over from Professor Jaroslaw Drelich as Editor in Chief of Surface Innovations. Jarek was very successful in the role and it is going to be a challenge to follow in his footsteps.

Currently I teach Biomaterials Science at Rhine Waal University in a degree that has just changed name to “Nature Inspired Materials” that I lead with my colleague Professor Raimund Sicking.  It has a much stronger natural science foundation than the other courses in the faculty and it has sometimes been difficult. I have carried out research in a number of areas of surface chemistry and physics, moving from colloids to corrosion to superhydrophobicity.  As you may imagine that means I worked with physicists, biologists, chemists and engineers during this time and was involved with research of very different types, which will give me an understanding of the breadth of the subjects that make up surface innovations and the differences in style that different fields have.

I studied physical chemistry, and my Ph.D. involved colloids and electrochemistry, then I moved to Germany and prepared colloids for a while before moving to corrosion protection using plasma treatment. One of our plasma coatings turned out to be superhydrophobic and when I moved back to the UK I joined a group working on super wetting phenomena.  From there I worked on a variety of research projects and became a research associate until moving to Germany as a professor, to a university that had recently opened, to play a part in building the courses.  At the moment I am working on liquid surface interactions and also electrochemistry in biological systems.

I was also responsible for a degree in science communication for its first few years. This lead me to think more deeply about the other aspects of the publication system as I had to fill in some of the gaps in teaching.  One of the more rewarding parts was teaching non-scientists how research works by getting them to carry out some research and write a paper, although teaching thermodynamics to writers was also very much fun.

The journal has just increased its impact factor to 3.5, which is a good sign that the journal under the previous EIC was becoming recognized.  I hope we can increase this further in the future.

Not only would I like to introduce myself, but I would also like to send a call to action, to all of you working in surface science to submit your papers to our journal, Surface Innovations. So that this publishing niche between many traditional subjects can continue to be served properly.

Submit your paper here:
https://ice-review.rivervalley.io/journal/jsuin

Surface Innovations 
Editor in Chief
Professor Neil Shirtcliffe