Richard was born in the town of Grantham, Lincolnshire and commenced his chemistry studies at Durham University, receiving his Master’s degree in 2014. He completed a final year project under the supervision of Dr. Ezat Khosravi utilizing thiol-ene click chemistry in the synthesis of thermosetting materials for coating applications. Later that year Richard joined the group of Professor David Haddleton to undertake a PhD at the University of Warwick, developing copper mediated polymerization strategies for the controlled polymerization of methacrylic, styrenic and acrylic monomers, with an industrial project synthesising cationic polymers for applications in gene delivery. He has spent 2 months as a visiting scholar at the University of California Santa Barbara under the supervision of Professor Craig Hawker in 2017 and completed his PhD in the summer of 2018. As of September 2018, he is an IAS Early Career Innovation Fellow, continuing to work in the group of Professor Haddleton..

Publications:

14. Cu(0)-RDRP of styrene: balancing initiator efficiency and dispersity

Richard Whitfield, Athina Anastasaki, Glen R. Jones, D. M. Haddleton, Polym. Chem. 2018, 9, 4395.

13. Efficient Binding, Protection, and Self-Release of dsRNA in Soil by Linear and Star Cationic Polymers

Richard Whitfield, Athina Anastasaki, Nghia P. Truong, Alexander B. Cook, Marta Omedes-Pujol, Vanessa Loczenski Rose, Tuan A. H. Nguyen, James A. Burns, Sébastien Perrier, Thomas P. Davis, David M. Haddleton, ACS Macro Letters, 2018, 7 (8), 909.

12. Cationic and hydrolysable branched polymers by RAFT for complexation and controlled release of dsRNA

Alexander Cook, Raoul Peltier, Matthias Hartlieb, Richard Whitfield, Guillaume Moriceau, James Burns, David Haddleton, Sebastien Perrier, Polymer Chemistry, 2018, 9, 4025.

11. Copper mediated polymerization without external deoxygenation or oxygen scavengers

Evelina Liarou^§, Richard Whitfield^§, Athina Anastasaki, Nikolaos G Engelis, Glen R Jones, Kelly Velonia, David M Haddleton, Angewandte Chemie, 2018, 57, 8998.

10. Copper Mediated Reversible Deactivation Radical Polymerization in Aqueous Media

Glen R Jones, Athina Anastasaki, Richard Whitfield, Nikolaos G Engelis, Evelina Liarou, David M Haddleton, Angewandte Chemie, 2018, 130, 10618.

9. Sequence-Controlled Methacrylic Multiblock Copolymers: Expanding the Scope of Sulfur-Free RAFT

Nikolaos G Engelis, Athina Anastasaki, Richard Whitfield, Glen R Jones, Evelina Liarou, Vasiliki Nikolaou, Gabit Nurumbetov, David M Haddleton Macromolecules, 2018, 51 (2), 336.

8. One-Pot Sequence-Controlled (SC) Multiblock Copolymers via Copper-Mediated Polymerization

Athina Anastasaki, Richard Whitfield, Vasiliki Nikolaou, Nghia P Truong, Glen R Jones, Nikolaos G Engelis, Evelina Liarou, Michael R Whittaker, David M Haddleton, Sequence-Controlled Polymers, John Wiley & Sons, 2018.

7. Cu (0)-RDRP of methacrylates in DMSO: importance of the initiator

Glen R. Jones ^§, Richard Whitfield ^§, Athina Anastasaki, Nuttapol Risangud, Alexandre Simula, Daniel J. Keddie, David M. Haddleton, Polym. Chem., 2018, 9, 2382.

6. Practical Chain-End Reduction of Polymers Obtained with ATRP

Will R. Gutekunst, Athina Anastasaki, David J. Lunn, Nghia P. Truong, Richard Whitfield, Glen R. Jones, Nicolas J. Treat, Allison Abdilla, Bryan E. Barton, Paul G. Clark, David M. Haddleton, Thomas P. Davis, Craig J. Hawker. Macromol. Chem. 2017, 218, 1700107.

5. Specific and Differential Binding of N-Acetylgalactosamine Glycopolymers to the Human Macrophage Galactose Lectin and Asialoglycoprotein Receptor

Joji Tanaka, Anne S. Gleinich, Qiang Zhang, Richard Whitfield, Kristian Kempe, David M. Haddleton, Thomas P. Davis, Sébastien Perrier, Daniel A. Mitchell, Paul Wilson, Biomacromolecules, 2017, 18 (5), 1633.

4. Universal Conditions for the Controlled Polymerization of Acrylates, Methacrylates and Styrene via Cu (0)-RDRP.

Richard Whitfield, Athina Anastasaki, Vasiliki Nikolaou, Glen R Jones, Nikolaos G Engelis, Emre H Discekici, Carolin Fleischmann, Johannes Willenbacher, Craig J Hawker, David M Haddleton, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2017, 139 (2), 1003.

3. Well-defined PDMAEA stars via Cu (0)-mediated reversible deactivation radical polymerization

Richard Whitfield, Athina Anastasaki, Nghia P Truong, Paul Wilson, Kristian Kempe, James A Burns, Thomas P Davis, David M Haddleton, Macromolecules, 2016, 49 (23), 8914.

2. Aqueous copper (II) photoinduced polymerization of acrylates: Low copper concentration and the importance of sodium halide salts

Glen R Jones, Richard Whitfield, Athina Anastasaki, David M Haddleton, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2016, 138 (23), 7346.

1. Discrete copper (II)-formate complexes as catalytic precursors for photo-induced reversible deactivation polymerization

Vasiliki Nikolaou, Athina Anastasaki, Francesca Brandford-Adams, Richard Whitfield, Glen R. Jones, Gabit Nurumbetov, David M. Haddleton, Polym. Chem., 2016, 7, 191.

Research Interests:

Controlled Living radical Polymerization

Light mediated polymerization

Polymer/RNA complexation and release strategies

Click Chemistry

Polymer/peptide conjugation

Conferences Attended:

European Polymer Federation (EPF), Dresden, Germany, 2015.

Warwick Polymer Conference, 2016

Syngenta Collaborative Conference, Jealotts Hill, 2016

ACS National Meeting (Spring), San Francisco, USA, 2017

Syngenta Collaborative Conference, Jealotts Hill, 2017

IUPAC World Polymer Congress (Macro18), Cairns, Australia 2018

Professional Memberships

American Chemical Society (ACS)

Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)

Macro group UK.

Email: r.b.whitfield@warwick.ac.uk

Office phone number:
+44 24 765 22179

Mailing address:
Department of Chemistry, University of Warwick
Library Road, CV4 7AL
Coventry, UK