Beatrice Jones

Bea first joined the group in October 2019 for her MSci research project, in the final year of her undergraduate degree in Natural Sciences at the University of Cambridge. After graduating with a First-Class degree, she returned to begin her PhD in October 2020, undertaking a joint project with Beamline B21 at the Diamond Light Source, in Oxfordshire. During her PhD, Bea explored how light-responsive surfactant assemblies, such as liquid crystals and micelles, could be harnessed for a variety of applications including solar-energy storage, controlled molecular delivery, or gas diffusion gates. As part of her project, she spent 18 months at Diamond Light Source, where she developed a system to enable in-situ light irradiation during small-angle X-ray scattering experiments.

In her spare time, Bea loves going for long walks (ideally involving a stone circle!), foraging for food in the countryside, and cooking for her friends.

Current Research

In recognition of her PhD work, Bea was awarded an EPSRC Doctoral Prize Fellowship, which she began in April 2025. She is currently developing photoswitchable DNA-based nanomaterials, in collaboration with Roger Rubio Sánchez and Lorenzo Di Michele at the Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, with the aim of creating stimuli-responsive synthetic-cell systems for biomedical applications.

Select Publications

Phase behaviour of light-responsive lyotropic liquid crystals for molecular solar thermal energy storage. B. E. Jones, Z. Wang, M. A. Zwijnenberg, C. J. C. Edwards-Gayle, K. Moth-Poulsen, N. Cowieson and R. C. Evans.* J. Am. Chem. Soc, 2025, 147, 32, 29349-29358. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/jacs.5c09267

Understanding X-ray-induced isomerisation in photoswitchable surfactant assemblies. B. E. Jones,* C. Blayo, J. L. Greenfield, M. J. Fuchter, N. Cowieson and R. C. Evans.* Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2005-2015. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3762/bjoc.20.176

Light-Driven Hexagonal-to-Cubic Phase Switching in Arylazopyrazole Lyotropic Liquid Crystals. B. E. Jones, J. L. Greenfield, N. Cowieson, M. J. Fuchter* and R. C. Evans*, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2024, 146, 18, 12315-12319. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/jacs.4c02709

Developing an in-situ LED Irradiation System for Small-Angle X-Ray Scattering at B21, Diamond Light Source. B. E. Jones, A. Fitzpatrick, K. Fowell, C. J. C. Edwards-Gayle, N. Khunti, K. Inoue, S. Daniels, E. Williams, C. Blayo, R. C. Evans and N. Cowieson*, J. Synchrotron Radiat. 2024, 31, 763-770. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1107/S1600577524003205

Light-Responsive Molecular Release from Cubosomes Using Swell-Squeeze Lattice Control. B. E. Jones, E. A. Kelly, N. Cowieson, G. Divitini and R. C. Evans*, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2022, 144, 42, 19532 – 19541. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/jacs.2c08583