Senali Kanchana

PhD candidate

Senali Kanchana received her B.Sc. (Honors) in Polymer Science from the University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka, in 2024. Then, she gained academic and research experience as a Graduate Teaching Assistant at the Department of Polymer Science. In 2025, she joined the PNG lab at the University of Sydney as a PhD student, where her research focuses on the designing multifunctional hydrogels.

Rachna Maria Kurian received her B.Sc. in Chemistry from the University of
Madras in 2019 and an M.Sc. in Polymer Chemistry from Mahatma Gandhi
University, India, in 2021. She gained three years of industrial research
experience in polymer science working at HLL Lifecare Ltd. and CSIR–National
Chemical Laboratory (NCL), Pune, India. In 2025, she joined the PNG Group as a
PhD student, where her research focuses on the development of injectable
biomimetic hydrogels.

Rachna Kurian

PhD candidate

Rachna Maria Kurian received her B.Sc. in Chemistry from the University of Madras in 2019 and an M.Sc. in Polymer Chemistry from Mahatma Gandhi University, India, in 2021. She gained three years of industrial research experience in polymer science working at HLL Lifecare Ltd. and CSIR–National Chemical Laboratory (NCL), Pune, India. In 2025, she joined the PNG Group as a PhD student, where her research focuses on the development of injectable biomimetic hydrogels.

Rachna Maria Kurian received her B.Sc. in Chemistry from the University of
Madras in 2019 and an M.Sc. in Polymer Chemistry from Mahatma Gandhi
University, India, in 2021. She gained three years of industrial research
experience in polymer science working at HLL Lifecare Ltd. and CSIR–National
Chemical Laboratory (NCL), Pune, India. In 2025, she joined the PNG Group as a
PhD student, where her research focuses on the development of injectable
biomimetic hydrogels.

Elizabeth Lai

Honours student

Elizabeth is studying Bachelors of Science and Advanced Studies majoring in Chemistry and Neuroscience at the University of Sydney. She is currently in her final Honours year under the supervision of Prof. Markus Müllner working on polymer self-assembly.

Dr Rebecca Yong Lai

Postdoctoral researcher

Rebecca completed her PhD at UNSW, under the supervision of Prof. Martina Stenzel, on the self-assembly of charged polymersomes in flow and manipulations to particle shape, morphology and processing. She also worked on developing temozolomide-loaded nanoparticles for glioblastoma treatment in and did a postdoc with Prof. Neeraj Sharma in collaboration with Synbiote for cellulose-derived gel and solid polymer electrolytes. She is now a Postdoctoral Researcher working with Prof Markus Müllner, Prof Chris Ling and Dr Wesley Dose on nano-templated battery materials.

Karun Mishra

PhD student

Karun Mishra completed Bachelor of Technology (Chemical Engineering) degree in 2017 from North Maharashtra University, India and completed his undergraduate research thesis in DIAT in India. He has 4.5+ years of industrial research experience, with an emphasis on polymer chemistry, and his most recent position was as Scale-Up Engineer at Daramic LLC. His Research within the PNG group focus on the development of molecular polymer brushes for the imitation of proteoglycan aggregates.

Professor Markus Müllner FRACI FHEA

Professor of Polymer Chemistry

Markus leads the Polymer Nanostructures Group at the Key Centre for Polymers and Colloids in the School of Chemistry. Markus studied polymer and colloid chemistry at the University of Bayreuth in Germany,  where he also earned his PhD in polymer chemistry (supervisor: Prof. Axel H.E. Müller). Markus was a McKenzie Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Melbourne, working with Prof. Frank Caruso before joining USyd in mid-2015. Markus was an ARC DECRA and then Future Fellow from 2018-2025. 

Christopher Nguyen

Honours student

Christopher graduated in 2025 with a Bachelor of Science, majoring in Chemistry and Medicinal Chemistry from the University of Sydney. They are now undertaking an Honours year in the Polymer Nanostructures Group (PNG) under the supervision of Prof. Markus Müllner. His project focuses on the development of polymer nanodiscs that can self-assemble directly in water.

Leon Quellmalz

PhD candidate

Leon graduated from the University of Helsinki with a BSc (Honours) in Chemistry in 2023 and a MSc in Materials Research (with a focus on polymer chemistry) in 2025, where he explored polysarcosine as an alternative to the widely used poly(ethylene glycol) in lipid-based nanoparticle systems. Shifting his focus from shell design to core chemistry, he joined the PNG as a PhD candidate in 2026 to investigate the self-assembly of molecular polymer bottlebrushes into nanodiscs.

Qinqin Yang

PhD student

Qinqin received her B.Eng. in Pharmaceutical Engineering with Honors from Zhejiang University of Science and Technology in China in 2021. Subsequently, she finished a M.Sc. degree in Pharmaceutics from the University College London (UCL) in the U.K. in 2023. In 2024, she started her PhD program at the University of Sydney. Her research focuses on polymer-CRISPR/Cas9 delivery in plant. Her research project involves close collaboration with the Jones lab in SOLES, promising a dynamic and interdisciplinary approach to her studies.

Dr Haoxiang Zeng

Postdoctoral Researcher

Haoxiang received his B.Sc. in Polymer Materials and Engineering from Taiyuan University of Technology in 2016 and M.Sc. in Industrial Chemistry from the National University of Singapore (with Prof. Li Jun) in 2018. He then worked at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research as a research assistant (with Prof. Tanja Weil) in 2019. In 2024, he completed his PhD at the University of Sydney supervised by Prof. Müllner, studying stimuli-responsive polymer self-assemblies. He rejoined our team as a postdoc working on injectable hydrogels in 2025.

Ping Zeng

PhD student

Ping received her B.Sc. in Chemical Engineering and Industrial Biological Engineering from Dalian University of Technology in 2020. She then completed her M.Med. in Pharmacy at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in 2023 under the guidance of Prof. Shengrong Guo, focusing on developing drug delivery systems in cancer therapy. With an interest in nanobiomedicine, Ping worked as a research assistant within A/Prof. Lu Zhang’s group at the Southern University of Science and Technology, designing transformable peptides against tumor metastasis. In 2024, she commenced her Ph.D. at the University of Sydney supervised by Prof. Müllner, studying on functional polymer nanodiscs for nanomedicine applications. Ping’s studies are supported by a postgraduate scholarship from the University of Sydney.