Rachel Ford

Rachel Ford is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), focusing on advanced materials science and electrochemical engineering. She holds a PhD in Chemistry from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and a BS in Chemistry from the University of Florida.

Education:

• PhD in Chemistry, Caltech (Advisor: Julie A. Kornfield & Mamadou S. Diallo)
• BS in Chemistry, University of Florida (Advisors: Prof. Ken Wagener & Prof. Ken Sloan)

Research Interests: Her work centers on polymer chemistry applications for sustainable energy solutions, including:

• Stabilizing sunscreens via polymer innovation
• Developing copper-based polymeric films for CO₂ electrochemical reduction
• Microstructure formation in mixed-matrix membranes

Awards: In 2019, she received the Best Student Poster Award at the US-Africa Forum on Nanotechnology Convergence for Sustainable Energy, Water, and Environment, where she also presented two research talks.

Labs & Teams: Her PhD research was conducted in the Butler Polymer Research Laboratory at the University of Florida, and she contributed to the Resnick Graduate Research Fellowship program at Caltech.