Professor Rachel L Gomes

Rachel Louise Gomes joined Council in 2015 as one of four Senate members. She is Professor of Water & Resource Processing, Head of the Food Water Waste Research Group, and leads the University Interdisciplinary Research Cluster, Water Works comprising >140 academics. Rachel is also a BAME staff network champion for the Faculty of Engineering and a trustee of the award winning Papplewick Pumping Station, providing an immersive educational experience for schoolchildren and securing a donation for Water Education Trust scholarships at the University.

Rachel holds a PhD from Imperial College London where she was named one of the ‘100 women, 100 visions’ celebrating women scientists and engineers at Imperial in 2009. She was awarded an Anne McLaren Fellowship to continue her research, which led to an academic position at the University of Nottingham late 2011. Rachel is currently on a joint fellowship alongside her Chair position, funded by the Royal Society and India Science & Engineering Research Board. In 2020, Rachel was named one of the Top 50 Women in Engineering on Sustainability by the Women’s Engineering Society, is one of only 2 UK-based researchers on the Analytical Scientist’s Top 40 under 40 Power List for developing analytics and technologies to deliver sustainable resources towards net zero (2014, 2018), and was 1 of 20 in the UK on the EPSRC Early Career Forum in Manufacturing Research (<2019).

Rachel’s research is on intelligent resource use in process environments where she focuses on waste/water and reuse in the urban water cycle and pollutant remediation and value recovery from process streams. Her research contributions to the University, local community and internationally led to an University Vice Chancellor’s Medal in 2020 and in 2017 she received the University Lord Dearing Award in recognition of her contributions to enhancing the student learning environment in chemical and environmental engineering. Rachel was recognised in the 2022 Birthday Honours List to mark the Queen's Platinum Jubilee celebrations for her services to research and education.

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