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What we do
- Focus on the understanding, design, and creation of soft materials and complex liquid microstructures in commercial products, biological tissues, and even soft robots.
- Maintain strength in microscopy, for quantitative study of soft material structures, and rheology, for measurement of flow and mechanical properties.
- Enable the development of novel active ingredient delivery methods for consumer products, respiratory delivery technologies for pharmaceuticals, and even new insights into environmental phenomena like thunderstorm asthma.
- Work with industry and academic partners to understand complex fluid product and material performance and design novel complex fluid materials and products.
- More background on our group and members can be found at our UNSW site and in this post.
- Prospective PhD and honours students: check our research projects page to see where you might want to work.
Research areas - Project pages
- Formulated product development and scale-up - Develop and evaluate innovative microstructured fluid products with biological and industrial relevance.
- Rheology measurement and design - Novel approaches to understanding the microstructure behind commercial fluid flows and performance
- 3D printing - Use surprising materials to print three-dimensional designs. How will your new food, biomaterial, cosmetic, or coating behave when you try to 3D print with it?
- Engineered nanocellulose - Harness bacterial producers of cellulose nanofibers to weave, template, and manufacture advanced materials.
- Emulsions and their shapes - Emulsion droplets are used in vaccines, pesticides, cosmetics, and foods by dispersing one liquid, like an oil, in another, like water.
- Cubosome and hexosome nanoparticles - Nanostructured liquid crystal particles with unique shape and biological function.
Recent articles - All publications
- Hosseini, M., Babayekhorasani, F., Guo, Z., Liang, K., Chen, V., Spicer, P. T., Propulsion, deformation, and confinement response of hollow nanocellulose millimotors, J. Coll. Int. Sci., 628, 435-445, (2022). pdf or preprint
- Marasini, N., Sheikh, Z., Wong, C., Hosseini, M., Spicer, P. T., Young, P., Ong, H. X., Traini, D., Development of excipients free inhalable co-spray-dried tobramycin and diclofenac formulations for cystic fibrosis using two and three fluid nozzles, Int. J. Pharm., 624, 121989, (2022). pdf
- Babayekhorasani, F., Hosseini, M., Spicer, P. T., Molecular and colloidal transport in bacterial cellulose biofilms, Biomacromolecules, 23, 6, 2404-2414 (2022). pdf or preprint
- Bradbury, P., Cidem, A., Mahmoodi, H., Davies, J., Spicer, P. T., Prescott, S., Kabakova, I., Ong, H., & Traini, D., Timothy Grass Pollen Induces Spatial Reorganisation of F-Actin and Loss of Junctional Integrity in Respiratory Cells, Inflammation, doi: 10.1007/s10753-021-01614-9 (2022). pdf
- Sebben, D., MacWilliams, S., Yu, L., Spicer, P., Bulone, V., Krasowska, M., & Beattie, D., Influence of Aqueous Phase Composition on Double Emulsion Stability and Colour Retention of Encapsulated Anthocyanins, Foods, 11, 134 (2022). pdf
- Muin, R., Spicer, P., Tang, K., Niu, Y., Hosseini, M., Mostaghimi, P., & Armstrong, R. T., Dynamic X-ray tomography of microfibrous cellulose liquid foams using deep learning. Chem. Eng. Sci., 248, 117173 (2022). pdf
- Giso, M., Zhao, H., Spicer, P. T., & Atherton, T., A phase diagram of morphologies for anisotropic particles sculpted from emulsions. JCIS, 605, 138-145 (2022). pdf
- Muin, R., Spicer, P., Tang, K., Niu, Y., Hosseini, M., Mostaghimi, P., & Armstrong, R. T., Dynamic X-ray tomography of microfibrous cellulose liquid foams using deep learning. Chem. Eng. Sci., 248, 117173 (2022). pdf
Recent blog posts - All posts
- 2017.03.11 ImageJ: Analyzing motion study
- 2017.01.22 ImageJ: Analyzing touching circles to characterize emulsion droplets
- 2017.01.22 Tools you need: ImageJ and FIJI
- 2014.02.05 Who we are
Recent talks - All talks
- Mar 2022 Arrested emulsion gels: Interpenetrating 3D colloid-droplet structures: ACS Spring 2022
- Dec 2021 Designing complex fluid rheology - microstructure and measurements: International Conference on Rheology
- Nov 2021 Returning to Academia from Industry: UNSW Chemical Engineering Research Society
- Oct 2021 3D arrested emulsion microstructures: Dow Chemical Interfacial Seminar
- Apr 2021 Rheology primer: RMIT School of Physics
- Mar 2021 The safest (colloidal) jellyfish in Australia!: CCNY Dept. Chemical Engineering
- Feb 2021 Rheology and job security: Australian Synchrotron Users Mtg.
- Feb 2021 Emulsions under arrest: ACIS Keynote in Food Colloids
Teaching - UNSW Sydney courses
- CEIC4007: Chemical Product Design Project Thesis A
- CEIC4008: Chemical Product Design Project Thesis B
- CEIC6711: Complex Fluid Microstructure and Rheology
Biography
Pat Spicer received a BS in Chemical Engineering from the University of Delaware in 1992.
In 1997 he completed a PhD in Chemical Engineering with the Particle Technology Group at
the University of Cincinnati. There his research focused on design and synthesis of colloidal
and nanoparticle materials. After defending his thesis, he went to work for the
Procter & Gamble Company, leading their Crystallization group in the Corporate Engineering
Division and supporting the scale-up and manufacture of complex fluid products for all of
P&G's product areas.
Recognizing the importance of fluid microstructures to product and process quality,
in 2006 Pat formed P&G's Microfluidics and Structured Fluids group, responsible for
development, characterization, scale-up, and modeling of microstructured fluids and
processes. Utilizing broad capability in microscopy, microfluidics, and microrheology,
the Mu Crew made significant contributions to all of P&G's liquid billion dollar brands and
collaborated with many of the leading academic groups focused on soft materials and complex fluids.
After 15 years with P&G, Pat began work as an Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering at
the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. There his research focuses on the
design and development of microstructured fluid materials by understanding their kinetic behavior.
His areas of focus in the field include the understanding of particle shape effects on materials
performance, interactions of soft matter with biological systems, and scale-up of soft matter
manufacturing processes when attributes other than composition control product quality.
A more flamboyant overview of my career can be
found here!
Contact: ptspicer at gmail dot com