Driven by curiosity. Driving changeBiography
Professor Clemens Kaminski is Professor of Chemical Physics and Head of the Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology at the University of Cambridge. He was Director of the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Sensor Technologies and Applications in an Uncertain World, a role he held from its launch in 2014 until 2026, handing over to Prof Lorenzo Di Michele. After completing his PhD at the University of Oxford in 1995, he held a Marie Curie postdoctoral fellowship and an Associate Professorship at the Lund Institute of Technology in Sweden before joining the University of Cambridge in 2001. He spent 2008 as a guest professor at SAOT School of Advanced Optical Technologies, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light, Erlangen, Germany. He was appointed at the University of Cambridge in 2001 and became Head of Department at CEB in 2020.
As well as being head of department and leader of his research group, Clemens is a Director of CamBridgeSens and is part of the management board of the Cambridge Advanced Imaging Centre and Openlabtools. He is the Director of Studies for chemical engineering at Robinson College and is part of the Access Panel committee for the UKRI’s STFC Central Laser Facility. He is also on the selection panel for the Philip Leverhulme Prize and on the editorial board for Methods in Applied Fluorescence and the Royal Society Interface Focus Journal.
He is also a Fellow of Optica, the Royal Society of Chemistry, and the Institute of Physics.
Research interests
- Optical sensing
- Neurodegeneration
- Cell Biology
- Microscopy
- Bioimaging
- Spectroscopy
Professor Kaminski’s group develops and applies advanced optical imaging methods to study biological processes at the molecular scale. The team combines super-resolution microscopy, molecular biotechnology, and machine learning to uncover the molecular mechanisms underlying disease. Their work is highly collaborative, involving scientists and clinicians across disciplines, and maintains close links with the department’s Molecular Neuroscience Group.
Awards and achievements
- 2004 Cyril Hinshelwood Prize (Royal Society of Chemistry)
- Felix Weinberg Prize (Combustion Institute)
- 2005 Philip Leverhulme Prize
- 2023 Rosalind Franklin Medal and Prize (Institute of Physics)
- Fellow of Optica, the Royal Society of Chemistry, and the Institute of Physics
Teaching and supervision
Professor Kaminski teaches and supervises across undergraduate and postgraduate levels, with a focus on optical imaging, sensor technologies, and molecular biophysics. His research group is always on the lookout for talented individuals and he welcomes students from diverse scientific backgrounds to pursue interdisciplinary research within the Laser Analytics Group.
Clemens is unavailable for consultancy work.
Professor Clemens Kaminski
Head of Department
Professor of Chemical Physics Director of CamBridgeSens Co-director of EPSRC Sensors CDT Laser Analytics research group leader