DrBenji Fenech Salerno

Dr. Benji Fenech-Salerno serves as a Teaching Fellow in Physical Chemistry at Imperial College London. He designs and delivers tutorials, lectures, and laboratory sessions for undergraduate and postgraduate students. Together with Dr. João Pedro Malhado, he acts as Year Tutor for first-year chemistry students and provides academic guidance, pastoral care, and professional development support as a personal tutor.

His research focuses on developing low-cost, point-of-care diagnostic devices. During his PhD at Imperial College London, supervised by Dr. Felice Torrisi, he created a diagnostic test strip costing under £0.20 per unit, using graphene field-effect transistor sensors and scalable manufacturing techniques. As a co-author of two successful Impact Accelerator Account grant applications, he helped secure funding to advance this technology towards commercialisation, a project he continues to contribute to alongside a research team. His earlier MRes in Nanomaterials at Imperial, under Regius Professor Chris Toumazou, developed a diagnostic tool for early detection of ovarian cancer biomarkers.

Dr. Fenech-Salerno earned his PhD in Chemistry and MRes in Nanomaterials from Imperial College London, and a BSc in Biology and Chemistry from the University of Malta. He has gained diverse research experience in functional genetics and solid-state chemistry through work at the University of Malta and exchange programmes at Newcastle University and the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg. His achievements have been recognised through awards such as an Innovate UK ICURe Discover grant, an Imperial College Trust General Conference Fund award, several RSC Researcher Development and Travel Grants, and prizes for conference presentations.