Professor Gosia Swadzba-Kwasny
Professor of Inorganic Chemistry at Queen's University Belfast
Chemistry · Material science
Gosia Swadzba-Kwasny is a chemist whose work operates behind the scenes of many of the technologies and industrial processes that modern society depends on. Rather than developing products people use directly, she focuses on making the chemical manufacturing processes behind them safer, cleaner and more sustainable.
Her work is guided by a simple question: “what can we realistically do better?”. She is passionate about finding the point where sustainability, ethics and economy meet, creating solutions that are genuinely implementable and can improve people's lives.
Alongside environmental considerations, Gosia's work is driven by a commitment to keeping people safe. From helping remove mercury from natural gas to developing safer chemicals and greener industrial processes, she works to reduce risks for workers, communities and the environment. More recently, she has explored how critical materials used in technologies such as electric vehicles and wind turbines can be recycled and reused, creating local jobs while reducing waste and supporting industries that benefit local communities.
Gosia is particularly interested in challenging simple narratives. She believes sustainability is rarely straightforward and that meaningful progress comes from engaging with complexity rather than searching for easy answers. Motivated by the belief that science should make life better in ways that people can actually see and experience, she hopes her work contributes to a future that is safer, more sustainable and one that, as she puts it, people can genuinely be proud of.
