Dr Ioannis Manolakis is a Lecturer in Chemistry in the Department of Life Sciences in ATU Sligo. Ioannis has a BEng (Hon) in Chemical Engineering and an MSc in Advanced Materials, both from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece, and a PhD in Polymer Chemistry (chemical modification of PEEK for composite material applications, Department of Chemistry, University of Reading, UK).
After several lead postdoctoral posts in the University of Reading (UK) and the Eindhoven University of Technology (NL), Ioannis joined the University of Limerick (UL) and the Irish Composites Centre (IComp) in August 2015 as Research Fellow in Composite Materials and IComp Research Coordinator, moving to Senior Research Fellow and Centre Manager in January 2018. Ioannis then joined IT Sligo as Assistant Lecturer in Chemistry on 01 November 2018 and progressed to Lecturer on 01 Jan 2022. Since 2015, Ioannis has won external research funding and completed related collaborative projects in H2020, Enterprise Ireland Innovation Partnership, Science Foundation Ireland Future Innovator Prize – Plastics Challenge 2020, Royal Society of Chemistry, Interreg Co-Innovate and the Marine Institute.

Ioannis’s research interests are in the wider domain of Materials Design & Interfaces and include:
– Polymer synthesis and modification for novel material concepts with emphasis on composite materials
– Bio-based and bio-inspired polymers
– Supramolecular chemistry and its applications to materials science
– Polymer coatings for various applications: adhesives, antifouling, lubricious and hydrophilic coatings