Projects per year
Personal profile
Personal Statement
I am a Professor in Chemistry at the University of Stratchlyde. I was born in London, but grew up in Cumbria in north west England. After obtaining a Masters degree in Chemistry from the University of Sheffield, I worked as a synthesis chemist for Norbrook Laboratories before reading my PhD in Chemistry at the University of Cambridge. Between 2008 and 2011, I was a postdoctoral researcher at Aarhus University in Denmark and then at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences in Leipzig, Germany. In 2012 I was awarded a Marie Curie Research Fellowship and returned to the UK to join the Department of Physics at the University of Strathclyde. I started as a Lecturer in the Department of Pure and Applied Chemistry in 2014. I was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2019, Reader in 2022, and Professor in 2025.
Research Interests
The main focus of my research is the development and application of molecular simulation and molecular informatics methods to solve industrially relevant problems at the interface between biochemistry and chemical physics. Recent examples have included the development of new methods for computational drug discovery (in collaboration with AstraZeneca, GSK, and Pfizer) and the design of an enzyme for use in food manufacturing (in collaboration with Chr. Hansen A/S). I am Founding Director of the cancer diagnostics company, Dxcover (formerly ClinSpec Diagnostics Ltd)
Expertise & Capabilities
- Theoretical and computational chemistry
- Solvation Thermodynamics
- Molecular Simulation
- Cheminformatics/Bioinformatics
- Drug Discovery
- Biochemistry
- Machine Learning
Education/Academic qualification
Doctor of Philosophy, University of Cambridge
Award Date: 1 Jan 2008
Master of Chemistry, University of Sheffield
Award Date: 1 Jan 2001
Keywords
- computational chemistry
- molecular simulation
- biochemistry
- chemical physics
- biophysics
- bionanotechnology
- integral equation theory of molecular liquids
- molecular dynamics
- molecular informatics
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Collaborations and top research areas from the last five years
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A Prosperity Partnership for the Design, Synthesis, and Evaluation of Next Generation Molecules Beyond Lipinski Space
Jamieson, C. (Principal Investigator), Beveridge, R. (Co-investigator), Burley, G. (Co-investigator), Kerr, W. (Co-investigator), Lindsay, D. (Co-investigator), Palmer, D. (Co-investigator) & Tomkinson, N. (Co-investigator)
EPSRC (Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council)
1/06/25 → 31/05/30
Project: Research
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Artificial Intelligence for Early Detection of Cancers from Spectroscopic Liquid Biopsies
Palmer, D. (Principal Investigator)
1/10/24 → 31/03/28
Project: Research - Studentship
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From lab to clinic: artificial intelligence with spectroscopic liquid biopsies
McHardy, R. G., Cameron, J. M., Eustace, D. A., Baker, M. J. & Palmer, D., 14 Oct 2025, In: Diagnostics. 15, 20, 28 p., 2589.Research output: Contribution to journal › Review article › peer-review
Open AccessFile -
Colorectal cancer molecular profiling: opportunities for early detection
Sala, A., van den Driest, L., Rattray, N. J. W., Johnson, C. H., Cameron, J. M., Khan, S. A., Palmer, D. S. & Baker, M. J., 1 Oct 2025, In: Clinical and Translational Medicine. 15, 10, 15 p., e70474.Research output: Contribution to journal › Review article › peer-review
Open AccessFile7 Downloads (Pure)
Datasets
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Data for "Blinded Predictions and Post-hoc Analysis of the Second Solubility Challenge Data: Exploring Training Data and Feature Set Selection for Machine and Deep Learning Models"
Conn, J. G. M. (Creator), Carter, J. W. (Creator), Conn, J. J. A. (Creator), Subramanian, V. (Creator), Baxter, A. (Creator), Engkvist, O. (Creator), Llinas, A. (Creator), Ratkova, E. L. (Creator), Pickett, S. D. (Creator), McDonagh, J. L. (Creator) & Palmer, D. S. (Creator), Zenodo, 11 May 2023
Dataset
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Data for: "PRFFECT: A Versatile Tool for Spectroscopists"
Smith, B. R. (Contributor), Baker, M. J. (Contributor) & Palmer, D. S. (Creator), Mendeley Data, 27 Jun 2023
DOI: 10.17632/t42j85xn68.2, https://doi.org/10.17632/t42j85xn68.1
Dataset
Prizes
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Chemical Structures Association Trust Grant
Palmer, D. (Recipient), 2 Jun 2014
Prize: Prize (including medals and awards)
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Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowship (FP7-PEOPLE-2010-IEF - 272391 - IETSOL)
Palmer, D. (Recipient), 1 Feb 2012
Prize: Fellowship awarded competitively
Activities
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Spectroscopic Liquid Biopsies for the Early Detection of Cancer
Palmer, D. (Speaker)
14 May 2025 → 15 May 2025Activity: Talk or Presentation › Invited talk
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Development of Solvation-Based Molecular Descriptors for Predicting Physicochemical Properties and Chromatographic Retention Times
Palmer, D. (Speaker)
30 Sept 2024 → 1 Oct 2024Activity: Talk or Presentation › Invited talk