Academic biography

Prof Deborah O'Connell is Director of the National Centre for Plasma Science and Technology (NCPST) and Full Professor in the School of Physical Sciences. She joined DCU through the Irish Government Senior Academic Leadership Initiative (SALI) in 2020. Prior to this she held a Chair and was also Director of the York Plasma Institute at the University of York, UK. Previously she held a UK EPSRC Career Acceleration Fellowship, and an EU Marie Curie Fellowship at Queen’s University Belfast. She also carried out a postdoc at Ruhr University Bochum in Germany, after completing her PhD from DCU. Her research interests mainly focus on developing plasma based technologies that enable solutions to tackle some of the global challenges in the biomedical and environmental sectors. 

Deborah has been recipient of international awards, including the European Physical Society (EPS) and Institute of Physics (IoP) Crookes Prize 2018 and the IoP Hershkowitz Award 2013. She has chaired and sits on several international committees and journal editorial boards, including the Board of Directors for the International Plasma Chemistry Society, co-founder of the International Conference on Data Driven Plasma Science, and Chair of the Plasma Science & Techniques Division of the International Union of Vacuum Science and Technology (IUVSTA).