Dr Apala Majumdar from our Department of Mathematical Sciences has been awarded a five-year EPSRC Career Acceleration Fellowship to fund her research programme on "The Mathematics of Liquid Crystals - Analysis, Computation and Applications".

Dr Majumdar joined our Department of Mathematical Sciences from the University of Oxford in August 2012. She also won the British Liquid Crystal Society Young Scientist Prize for 2012 in March.

The EPSRC Career Acceleration Fellowships are awarded to outstanding researchers at an early stage of their career to enable them to build an independent career of international standing.

Apala Majumdar will use her fellowship to address fundamental questions in the theoretical foundations of liquid crystal science, especially for defects and microstructures, and these theoretical tools will, in turn, be applied to practical questions in the design and optimisation of liquid crystal displays.