Chemistry

With an international reputation for research excellence, and a track record in high quality training for chemistry students, Loughborough's Department of Chemistry offers popular and industry-relevant opportunities, enabling you to develop multidisciplinary skills.

Top 15 in the UK for Chemistry The Guardian University Guide 2023
£17m You'll have access to our £17M STEMLab facility
£6m You'll have access to our newly refurbished chemistry labs.

Chemistry at Loughborough

As a postgraduate student you will become part of a stimulating and inclusive academic community. You will be taught by academic staff who are regularly engaged in high-profile, high-impact research projects tackling real-world problems in vital areas such as energy and the environment, defence and security, and health and medicine. Our academic and research staff are nationally and internationally recognised as experts in their fields.

Your MSc study enables you to extend the knowledge gained at undergraduate level and develop professional skills in a range of specialist chemical sciences. A postgraduate degree in chemistry from Loughborough can open up careers in the pharmaceutical and food industries, analytical and environmental laboratories, public and regulatory utilities, and industrial laboratories. It can also pave the way for further research as a PhD.

The choice of emphasis available through the elective modules on our programmes enables you to tailor your study to best suit your own career aspirations and areas of interest. 

Your studies will be enhanced by state-of-the-art facilities, including the University’s £17 million STEMLab and a £6 million investment in newly refurbished chemistry laboratories. Our research labs and study areas enable you to gain first-hand experience of the latest techniques in analytical, environmental, inorganic, organic and physical chemistry.

Research degrees

In addition to our taught programmes, there is also a variety of funded and unfunded opportunities to join the Department of Chemistry as a doctoral researcher. You can develop your own unique research proposal or browse our current list of PhD opportunities – either way, we’d love to hear from you.

Browse our PhD opportunities

Research and teaching

Our academic staff are active in industry-relevant research spanning a range of areas, including energy markers and detection, crime and security, chemical process technologies, and catalysis and functional molecules. As a student on one of our taught master’s degrees you will benefit from their expertise and insights.

Our chemistry programmes are designed to provide you with research training, developing your project-specific experimental skills to complete a substantial research or development project at the forefront of the discipline, and managed according to modern industrial practice.

We have a range of opportunities that you can get involved with outside of your studies. This includes our STEM project where you can volunteer to become a Science Engineering Ambassador and work in local Schools to encourage young people to engage in Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths activities. This rewarding project will be fantastic experience if you are interested in a career in science and teaching.

Links with industry

We have robust, long-standing links with the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, and our academic staff and research students frequently work alongside our industry partners on major research and development projects.

Facilities

Our Department facilities include research laboratories and study areas that enable you to gain first-hand experience of the latest techniques in analytical, environmental, inorganic, organic and physical chemistry.

We offer additional facilities for the study of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, high resolution mass spectrometry and X-ray crystallography.

Students can also benefit from access to STEMLab, offering the most advanced and up-to-date laboratories for students across a range of disciplines.

Our laboratories contain a full range of analytical and spectroscopic instrumentation, a world-class mass spectrometry suite, single crystal and powder X-ray diffraction, laser spectroscopy and a dedicated bio-lab.

Career opportunities

Your postgraduate degree has been designed to equip you with industry-relevant expertise and knowledge and key transferable skills.

You will build skills, knowledge and abilities in health and safety, problem-solving and planning, observation measurement and statistical techniques, and the use of information technology, computational and data-processing skills for the analysis and presentation of chemical information and data. There will also be opportunities to grow in team-working, organisational skills, time management and presentation.

As a Loughborough University student, you will have access to the support and resources of our Careers Network.

Graduates from our programmes have progressed to careers in a range of industries including drug synthesis and development, pharmaceutical analysis, drug formulation and delivery, food science and technology, water purification, research and teaching.

Recent destinations for our postgraduate students include 3M, Mars Incorporated, Minerva Scientifics, NHS, Pharmaron UK Ltd., Medochemie Ltd., and Datlabs (Pvt) Ltd.