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I was lucky to have had a fantastic chemistry teacher when I was an A-level student – Mr Thomson at the Dronfield School, near Sheffield. His enthusiasm was infectious. I can still remember lots of experiments that we performed in his class, like making aspirin. His chemistry classes helped me to understand why chemistry is so important and interesting, and that feeling of excitement at learning new things never left me.

Every scientist knows the feeling of discovery – there is a brief window of time when you've first discovered something or come up with a new insight, and you're the only person in the world who knows! That's a great feeling, and sharing that new knowledge or idea with others is brilliant, too.

Science is a creative activity - don't be afraid to be curious, inquisitive, and inventive.

As a computational chemist, I'm interested in the possibilities of quantum computing. It's not yet clear (to me, anyway) how future chemists will routinely use such technologies, but the concepts and ideas being explored at the interface of quantum technologies and chemistry are certainly highlighting different ways of thinking about chemistry on computers.

There are so many global challenges that demand chemistry problem-solving – climate change and carbon dioxide mitigation, plastic pollution, sustainable materials, clean water, air pollution, antibiotic drug development, and more. Chemistry provides a pathway to addressing these challenges by turning knowledge of molecular-level processes into real-world applications that will make the world a safer, healthier, and more equal place.