Robert Hill

Professor Robert Hill undertook his Ph.D with Dame Julia Higgins at Imperial College on Spinodal Decomposition in Polymer Mixtures. In the 1980s he worked on calcium fluorosilicate glasses at the Laboratory of the Government Chemist in the UK and was part of the Group that won the Queens Award for Technology for the development of Glass Ionomer Cements. Professor Hill is a member of TC4 that deals with Biomedical Applications of Glass and also of TC7 that deals wth Glass-Ceramics. In 1999 Hill was recruited to Imperial College by the late Larry Hench, where he was Professor of Biomaterials and worked on Bioactive Glasses. Hill is an expert on fluorine containing glasses and glass-ceramics. In 2007 he worked on high fluorine content glasses used in steel making and in 2009 this led to the development of fluorine containing bioactive glasses.

Hill moved from Imperial College to Queen Mary’s Dental School to exploit the fluoride glass technology in the Dental Field. In 2013 he won the Alan Wilson Dental Materials Prize and led the group that won the  Amourers and Brasiers Venture Prize in 2013 for the development of Halogen containing bioactive glasses. In 2014 he founded BioMin Technologies Ltd (see www.biomin.co.uk) that sells Halogen containing glass powders to toothpaste manufacturers, as well as selling BioMinF® and BioMinC® toothpastes. The company is based on three patents and is licensing the Technology further to Dental companies for varnishes, composite fillings and adhesives.

Professor Hill has published over 260 refereed papers and filed over 20 patents. He is currently Chair of Dental Physical Sciences and Research Director for the Institute of Dentistry. He also sits on Queen Mary’s Impact and Engagement Committee.