Maurice Collins Professor

Prof Maurice N. Collins is a Materials Scientist and Principal Investigator (PI) in the School of Engineering at the University of Limerick. He is a member of the Bernal Institute, the Health Research Institute and FI at AMBER. He has successfully led the H2020 funded LIBRE consortium (lignin for carbon fiber), the largest consortium in biobased carbon fibre research in Europe as well as being PI on multiple national funded projects. He is currently scientific and dissemination manager of the Horizon Europe funded VIBES consortium.

His expertise is in biopolymer science which includes Tissue Engineering/Regenerative medicine, hydrogels and biobased carbon fibre precursor materials as well as the development of 3D printable (bio)polymers. He works on the cascading principle – whereby higher value applications are preferentially derived from biological resources, through the utilisation of waste bioresources from forestry to produce advanced engineering materials for automotive, biomedical and energy applications.

Prof Collins has a strong track record in attracting multiple industrially funded research projects. This work has led to 4 licensing agreements and 9 patent filings. Coupled to this, he has authored >150 publications and his research has featured in various national and international media outlets. His research has been recognised through multiple awards. His work to date has led to >5.5k citations with a h-index of 43.

He is currently PI on several AMBER industry projects, NXTGENWOOD, ECOSITE and is part of the Horizon Europe VIBES consortia.

He currently supervises 8 PhD candidates, 6 postdocs and is Course Director for the MSc in Biomedical Device Materials. He was recently awarded the Bernal Institute senior researcher of the year award and was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry.