Chemistry, University of Southampton

Phil Gale's Publications and Citation Metrics

Philip Gale received his BA (Hons) in 1992 and DPhil in 1995 from the University of Oxford. He then moved to the University of Texas at Austin where he spent two years as a Fulbright Scholar. In 1997 he was awarded a Royal Society University Research Fellowship and returned to the Department of Chemistry at Oxford. In 1999 he moved as a Lecturer to the University of Southampton and was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2002, Reader in 2005 and to a Personal Chair in Supramolecular Chemistry in 2007. Phil is currently the Head of Chemistry at the University of Southampton.

Phil's research interests focus on the supramolecular chemistry of anionic species and in particular the molecular recognition, sensing and lipid bilayer transport of anionic species. Transmembrane anion transporters have potential applications in the development of future treatments for cystic fibrosis and cancer.

He is the author or co-author of over 190 publications including an Oxford Chemistry Primer on Supramolecular Chemistry with Paul Beer and David Smith (1999) and an RSC Monograph in Supramolecular Chemistry entitled Anion Receptor Chemistry with Jonathan Sessler and Won-Seob Cho (2006). He is the co-editor in chief (with Jonathan Steed) of a new 8-volume reference work published by Wiley entitled Supramolecular Chemistry: from molecules to nanomaterials.

Phil has won a number of research prizes including the Society/Journal of Porphyrins and Phthalocyanines Young Investigator Award (2004), the Bob Hay Lectureship from the RSC UK Macrocycles and Supramolecular Chemistry Group (2004) and the Corday-Morgan medal and prize from the Royal Society of Chemistry (2005) for ‘contributions to coordination and supramolecular chemistry, in particular selective anion recognition and sensing.' He was recently awarded a JSPS invitation fellowship that he held at Kyushu University, Japan in 2011 and has also been appointed as a guest Professor by Xiamen University, China (2012-2014).

Phil serves as the Chair of the Editorial Board of the RSC's flagship reviews journal Chemical Society Reviews. He is also the co-editor of the journal Supramolecular Chemistry, and a member of the international editorial advisory boards of Coordination Chemistry Reviews, the Encyclopaedia of Supramolecular Chemistry and Chemical Communications.

He is the Head of the UK's National Crystallography Service based in Chemistry at Southampton.  In 2004 he joined the International Scientific Committee of the International Symposium on Macrocyclic and Supramolecular Chemistry (ISMSC) and organised this meeting in the UK in 2011. Phil is also a member of RSC Science, Education and Industry Board (2009-2012), the EPSRC College and served on France's ANR Laboratories of Excellence Jury in 2011 and 2012. He is a member of the management group of COST Action CM1005 Supramolecular Chemistry in Water. In 2012 he was elected chair of the RSC Macrocyclic and Supramolecular Chemistry Group.

Anions are ubiquitous in the Natural world. Chloride anions are present in large quantities in the oceans; nitrate and sulfate are present in acid rain; and carbonates in biomineralised materials. Anthropogenic anions including pertechnetate, a radioactive product of nuclear fuel reprocessing, and phosphate and nitrates from agriculture and other human activities, constitute major pollution hazards. Anions are also critical to the maintenance of life. Indeed, without exaggeration, the recognition, transport or transformation of anions is involved at some level in almost every conceivable biochemical operation. It is essential in the formation of the majority of enzyme–substrate and enzyme–cofactor complexes as well as in the interaction between proteins and RNA or DNA. ATP, phosphocreatine and other high-energy anionic phosphate derivatives, power processes as diverse and important as biosynthesis, molecular transport and muscle contraction while serving as the energy currency for a host of enzymatic transformations. Anion channels and carriers are involved in the transport of small anions such chloride, phosphate and sulfate and thus serve to regulate the flux of key metabolites into and out of cells while maintaining osmotic balance.

Supramolecular chemistry is the area of chemistry involved with the control of molecular interactions to produce useful new devices and molecular assemblies. Our work in molecular recognition involves the design and synthesis of smart molecules for use as receptors or sensors for other ionic (in our group frequently anionic) or molecular species. Design is at the heart of our work – we are frequently inspired by biological systems – but are not limited by them – we ultimately design and make new molecules ourselves that allows us to explore a wide range of molecular geometries and functional groups (and is a lot of fun!). So we can take a molecule from the drawing board through to use as a sensor, selective extraction agent or membrane transport agent for a particular chemical species. A wide range of skills are need to do this including synthesis and also the ability to study how molecules interact with each other using NMR and UV/vis spectroscopies, isothermal titration calorimetry and electrochemistry. Working with the world-leading crystallographers in the school we also study the structure of receptors and complexes in the solid state. Our specific interests are in the structural chemistry, selective recognition and sensing of anionic species. Anions have historically been neglected species in molecular recognition and it has only been since the late 1980s that significant effort has been devoted to the problem of selective anion complexation and recognition.

Research keywords

Supramolecular Chemistry, Anion Receptor Chemistry, Coordination Chemistry, Hydrogen bonding, Membrane Transport.

Research funding

2013 DSTL MOD CDE 28704 Generation after next chemical, biological & radiological hazard mitigation systems. (£85k)

2012-2015 EU Interreg “A-I Chem Channel” D.C. Harrowven, R.C.D. Brown, B. Linclau, R.J. Whitby, R. Raja, E. Stulz, P.A. Gale. £613666.

2012-2015 EPSRC Responsive Mode: “Synthetic Anionophores with Therapeutic Potential – A coordinated two centre approach (£317k to Southampton, P.A Gale (PI)) (£683k to Bristol A.P. Davis (PI) (Bristol) and D.N. Sheppard (Bristol)).

2010-2015 EPSRC UK National Crystallography Service (£3.57m).

2008-2012 EPSRC Project “Selective receptors for the transmembrane transport of bicarbonate (£425k) EPSRC-NSF Collaboration in conjunction with Prof. Jeff Davis (University of Maryland).

2006-2010 EU Marie Curie Transfer of Knowledge Partnership “Food-BioSens” (€95k) Collaborative grant with Prof Jerzy Radecki, Poland.

2006-2009 EPSRC Project studentship “C-Cycle” (£105k)

2006-2009 EPSRC “Supramolecular Approaches to Membrane Co-transport of HCl” (£208k)

Primary research group:  Molecular Assembly, Function and Structure

Research projects