On December 17th, 2026, the LCN hosted an Academic-Industry Meeting Day at Imperial College’s Royal School of Mines. Over 50 attendees, including LCN academics and industry professionals from 15 companies and organisations, gathered to explore the benefits of nanoscience and nanotechnology solutions for industry. The day fostered discussion, collaboration and new connections, offering insights from both academic and industry perspectives.
The programme centred around three LCN challenges: overcoming energy bottlenecks, life matter interfaces and realising quantum advantage. Panel discussions, presentations workshops and a poster session were included.
The day kicked off with introductions from LCN Directors Prof Sandrine Heutz and Prof Steven Bramwell. Dr Shelly Conroy, Associate Professor in Materials at Imperial, then spoke about collaboration with industry through PhD studentships on the Centre for Doctoral Training in Advanced Characterisation of Materials. Dr Conroy was joined by three doctoral students whose PhDs are sponsored by industry, including Rolls Royce and Cameca. They shared their experiences of industry-sponsored studentships, discussing interactions with industry, project development, challenges, successes and outputs.
The day also featured presentations from Prof Andrew Fisher, Professor of Physics at UCL and Modelling Development Lead at Quantum Motion, and Prof Mark Green, Professor of Physics at KCL and Director of Research at Streambio. These talks explored the establishment of industry-academic partnerships and their advantages.
Workshop sessions focused on three key LCN challenges: overcoming energy bottlenecks, life matter interfaces and realising quantum advantage. Attendees engaged in discussions and considered key questions formulated to address industry interests, concerns and queries about nanotechnology and its applications. Topics included identifying the biggest research and development questions and opportunities in their fields.
The day concluded with a poster session where attendees could meet PhD students and learn more about their research.
