School of Dentistry

Dr Inder Preet Kaur

Honorary Research Fellow
School of Dentistry
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Researcher biography

Dr Kaur is working as an Honorary Research Fellow/Lecturer within the School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland, Australia. Along with her current work on 'Topically applied nano silver biocomposites in Dentistry', she is providing hands on research supervision to higher degree research students.

Dr Kaur's research interests include understanding the surface chemistry at nanoscale, development of nanomaterial libraries for specific applications, characterization using sophisticated spectroscopic and microscopic techniques, behavioral difference between nanoparticles and metal ions, understanding the nano-bio (eco) interactions through the corona formation, quantification and life cycle assessment of nanomaterials in both biological tissues and environmental samples. Her research philosophy is to encourage her students to explore and perform research in areas that they find interesting.

Career overview

PhD Nano-biochemistry (2015)

MSc Chemistry and Biochemistry (2004)

BSc Chemistry and Biology (2002)

Dr Kaur completed her PhD on a MRC-NERC funded project at the University of Birmingham, UK on understanding the surface chemistry of cerium oxide nanoparticles and their uptake and internalisation in human lung epithelial cells (A549). In this work, she developed a library of ceria nanoparticles with a range of functionalities and quantified their oxidation states using STEM-EELS, XPS and XAS. She was a visiting researcher (2012-2015) at University of South Carolina, USA and worked on collaborative research with Public health , USA which gave her substantial international research experience. Dr Kaur worked for 2.5 years (2015-2017) as a postdoctoral research fellow in the famous 'FENAC lab' at University of Birmingham which is UK's national facility for Environmental nanoscience analysis and characterisation and worked with the foremost leaders in their field. During this period, she worked on a NERC funded project towards the development of isotopically labelled and biologically compatible silver nanoparticles with different functionalities for various biomedical and environmental applications. In particular, the focus was to provide a robust protective surface coating to the nanoparticles in order to inhibit the dissolution process in aquatic Zebrafish media. The nanopaticles were fed to Zebrafish and quantified for their multi-generational bioaccumulation using stable isotope tracers in a collaborative work with University of Exeter and Imperial College London, UK.

Before joining UQ, Dr Kaur worked as a Lecturer and then Senior Lecturer in Inorganic and bio-chemistry at Nottingham Trent University, UK. She was the module leader for Year 2 and taught Inorganic chemistry to all levels of undergraduate classes along with Nano and green Technology as well as Biochemistry modules. She has successfully supervised 2 BSc, 2 MRes and 2 PhD students in the past and is currently supervising 2 PhD students at UQ. She has published in High impact journals and presented papers at both National and International Conferences. Recently, she was an invited speaker and honoured at Queensland Parliament for her community work and public service.

Scientific Leadership, Awards and Research grants

  • Nov 2022: Invited speaker and honoured with an appreciation momento for community work and public service by member of Parliament Hon Stirling Hinchliffe at Queensland Parliament, Queensland, Australia.
  • Oct 2017: GBP 20,000 for research projects, Nottingham Trent University UK research grants 2018.
  • Feb 2015: GBP 98,000 NERC Research fellowship in nanoscience, University of Birmingham, UK
  • Nov 2014: GBP 1000 Best doctoral project award by Diamond Light Source, Annual XAS meeting, UK
  • Jun 2014: Best Poster award by Public health England, Indoor and outdoor pollution annual meeting, Solihull, UK
  • Nov 2013: Invited Panel member, Special workshop on nano-ceria, organised by Sustainable Nanotechnology Organisation, Santa Barbara, California, USA
  • 2013-2014: Post-graduate research representative for Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, UK
  • Sep 2012: Travel award, 2000 CAD, 7th ICEENN, Banff, Alberta, Canada
  • Sep 2011: NERC funded doctoral studentship, University of Birmingham, UK
  • July 2002: Awarded with the 'college colour' by Govt. Mohindra college, Patiala, India
  • 2001-2002: Editor in chief of the college science magazine, Govt. Mohindra college, Patiala, India
  • Feb 1999: Nominated for outstanding student of the year award, MSSS, Patiala, India

External positions

  • 2022-Present: Candidature Chair for MPhil thesis, School of Dentistry, Herston, University of Queensland, Australia.
  • 2020-2021: Guest Editor 'Environmental Science: Nano'.
  • 2012-2017: Founder and organiser of Cross Campus meeting platform called NANOForum, University of Birmingham, UK
  • 2017-2019: External examiner for research degrees, University of Central Lancashire, UK, September
  • October 2017 to present: Co-Editor of journal 'Advances in Nanotechnology'.

Research collaborators and funding agencies:

Natural Environment Research Council, UK

University of Birmingham, UK

University Of South Carolina, USA

Public Health England, UK

Medical Research Council, UK

Imperial College London, UK

University Of Exeter, UK

National Physical Laboratories, UK

BAM Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing, Germany

Université Paris-Saclay, CEA Saclay, France

Université Grenoble Alpes, France

Publications

Journal Articles (8)
Conference Papers (14)
Video Document (1)
Thesis (1)

Journal Articles

Almuqrin, Amjad, Kaur, Inder Preet, Walsh, Laurence J., Seneviratne, Chaminda Jayampath and Zafar, Sobia (2023). Amelioration strategies for silver diamine fluoride: moving from black to white. Antibiotics, 12 (2) 298, 1-18. doi: 10.3390/antibiotics12020298
Minelli, Caterina, Wywijas, Magdalena, Bartczak, Dorota, Cuello-Nunez, Susana, Infante, Heidi Goenaga, Deumer, Jerome, Gollwitzer, Christian, Krumrey, Michael, Murphy, Karen E., Johnson, Monique E., Bustos, Antonio R. Montoro, Strenge, Ingo H., Faure, Bertrand, Hoghoj, Peter, Tong, Vivian, Burr, Loic, Norling, Karin, Hook, Fredrik, Roesslein, Matthias, Kocic, Jovana, Hendriks, Lyndsey, Kestens, Vikram, Ramaye, Yannic, Lopez, Maria C. Contreras, Auclair, Guy, Mehn, Dora, Gilliland, Douglas, Potthoff, Annegret, Oelschlagel, Kathrin ... Shard, Alexander G. (2022). Versailles project on advanced materials and standards (VAMAS) interlaboratory study on measuring the number concentration of colloidal gold nanoparticles. Nanoscale, 14 (12), 4690-4704. doi: 10.1039/d1nr07775a
Kaur, Inder, Ellis, Laura-Jayne, Romer, Isabella, Tantra, Ratna, Carriere, Marie, Allard, Soline, Mayne-L'Hermite, Martine, Minelli, Caterina, Unger, Wolfgang, Potthoff, Annegret, Rades, Steffi and Valsami-Jones, Eugenia (2017). Dispersion of Nanomaterials in Aqueous Media: Towards Protocol Optimization. Journal of Visualized Experiments (130). doi: 10.3791/56074
Raza, Ghulam, Amjad, Muhammad, Kaur, Inder, Baalousha, Mohammed, Lead, Jamie and Wen, Dongsheng (2016). Correction to stability and aggregation kinetics of titania nanomaterials under environmentally realistic conditions. Environmental Science and Technology, 50 (22), 12525-12525. doi: 10.1021/acs.est.6b05148
Raza, Ghulam, Amjad, Muhammad, Kaur, Inder and Wen, Dongsheng (2016). Stability and aggregation kinetics of titania nanomaterials under environmentally realistic conditions. Environmental Science and Technology, 50 (16), 8462-8472. doi: 10.1021/acs.est.5b05746
Collin, Blanche, Auffan, Melanie, Johnson, Andrew C., Kaur, Inder, Keller, Arturo A., Lazareva, Anastasiya, Lead, Jamie R., Ma, Xingmao, Merrifield, Ruth C., Svendsen, Claus, White, Jason C. and Unrine, Jason M. (2014). Environmental release, fate and ecotoxicological effects of manufactured ceria nanomaterials. Environmental Science: Nano, 1 (6), 533-548. doi: 10.1039/c4en00149d
Verma, Raman K., Aggarwal, Monika, Bansal, Manisha and Kaur, Inder Preet (2007). New, Facile Approach to Biologically Significant and Functionalizable Heterobiaryls (IV). ChemInform, 38 (45). doi: 10.1002/chin.200745131
Verma, Raman K., Aggarwal, Monika, Bansal, Manisha and Kaur, Inder Preet (2007). A facile and new approach to synthesize 2-amino-4-(4-amoinophenyl)-1H-1,3-diazol-1-yl-alkylaminomethanethiones. Medicinal Chemistry Research, 15 (9), 483-491. doi: 10.1007/s00044-007-9003-1

Conference Papers

Kaur, I. and Crawfard, Alys (2018). Synthesis and characterisation of polymer coated nano zerovalent Iron particles for the removal of chromium (VI) from groundwater. Annual Meeting, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, United Kingdom, February 2018.
Kaur, I. and Valsami-Jones, E. (2017). Synthesis and characterisation of chemically robust silver nanoparticles. MERCIA Meeting, United Kingdom, December 2017.
Kaur, I. and Valsami-Jones, E. (2016). Synthesis and characterisation of chemically robust silver nanoparticles and their dissolution studies in Daphnia media. UK Bio-XFEL workshop, Diamond Light Source, Oxford, United Kingdom, June 2016.
Kaur, I. and Lead, J.R. (2014). Understanding the surface chemistry of nanoceria using STEM-EELS and XPS. Indoor and outdoor pollution annual review meeting, Solihull, United Kingdom, July 2014.
Kaur, I. and Lead, J.R. (2014). Understanding the surface chemistry of nanoceria using STEM-EELS and XPS and their size specific uptake studies in human lung epithelial cells (A549). 9th ICEENN, South Carolina, United States, 7-11 September 2014.
Kaur, I. and Lead, J.R. (2013). Multi-method approach: synthesis and characterisation of cerium oxide nanoparticles. United Kingdom Surface Analysis Forum (UKSAF) meeting, Oxford, United Kingdom, 21-23 January 2013.
Kaur, I. and Lead, J.R. (2013). Synthesis and characterisation of ceria nanospheres, nanocubes and nanorods. Nanotechnology symposium 2013 organised by Royal Society of Chemistry, London, United Kingdom, December 2013.
Kaur, I. and Lead, J.R. (2013). Quantifying Ceria oxidation states using STEM-EELs and XPS. 2nd Sustainable Nanotechnology Organization conference (SNO), Santa Barbara, CA, United States, 3-5 November 2013.
Kaur, I. and Lead, J.R. (2013). Quantifying Ceria oxidation states using STEM-EELs and XPS. Workshop on nano-ceria by Sustainable Nanotechnology Organization, Santa Barbara, CA, United States, November 2013.
Kaur, I. and Lead, J.R. (2013). Synthesis and characterisation of ceria nanoparticles using various microscopic and spectroscopic techniques. FABLE steering group meeting, Birmingham, United Kingdom, December 2013.
Kaur, I. and Lead, J.R. (2012). Understanding the surface chemistry of ceria nanorods using a multi-method approach. 7th International Conference on the Environmental Effects of Nanoparticles and Nanomaterials (ICEENN), Alberta, Canada, 10-12 September 2012.
Kaur, Inder Preet (2007). 3D QSAR studies on newly designed phenylpropanoic acid based PPARγ agonists as potent insulin sensitizers. 3rd International Symposium Current Trends In drug Discovery Research, Lucknow, India, 17-21 February 2007.
Kaur, Inder Preet (2007). Synthesis and 3D QSAR studies of 2-aminoimidazolines and their isosteres as central α2 -adrenoceptor agonists. 3rd International Symposium Current Trends In drug Discovery Research, Lucknow, India, 17-21 February 2007.
Kaur, Inder Preet (2007). Ideal synthesis and comparative alignment studies of phenylpyridine and phenylpyridopyrimidine based compounds with expected antiasthmatic activity. 3rd International Symposium Current Trends In drug Discovery Research, Lucknow, India, 17-21 February 2007.

Video Document

Kaur, Inder (2017). Dispersion of nanomaterials in aqueous media: towards protocol optimization.

Thesis

Kaur, Inder Preet (2015). Understanding the surface chemistry of ceria nanoparticles using a multi-method approach. PhD Thesis, Material Sciences, University of Birmingham, United Kingdom.