ÌÇÐÄTV

Contact Details

Email: M.Horbury@warwick.ac.uk

Telephone: +44(0)2476151013

Office: E0.11a

Lab: E0.19

Biological systems have always had to contend with the ultraviolet radiation produced by the sun, which has led to a myriad of mechanisms to deal with any deleterious effects. While many intrinsic defence mechanisms exist within biomolecules, they are not perfect, therefore many biological systems employ molecules that preferentially absorb ultraviolet radiation, i.e. melanin pigments in human skin. However, yet again, this photoprotective mechanism has flaws, a delayed response, and in humans this can lead to sunburn or in severe cases, skin cancer. This had led to the use of artificial sunscreens to bolster the photoprotection of the human skin and avoid these dangerous side effects of sun exposure.

In recent years several synthetic molecules used within commercial sunscreen formula have come under scrutiny, with several being found to be phototoxic. This has led to the idea of exploring the photodynamics in other natural photoprotective biomolecules, like sinapate esters (a sub class of hydroxycinnamates), to potentially provide a new avenue towards making superior synthetic sunscreens.

To observe the photochemistry of these sunscreens, femtosecond resolution spectroscopy is required, therefore I use condensed-phase femtosecond transient electronic (UV/visible) absorption spectroscopy to do this. This technique has given unique insight into several synthetic sunscreen molecules, as well as several natural photoprotective molecules. My current work has focussed mainly on sinapate esters, the photoprotective molecules found in plant leaves.

Recently, building off the work on sinapate esters, I have been exploring the photochemistry of a series of synthetic molecules with the potential to be new sunscreening agents.

While there is a plethora of photoprotective mechanisms, both natural and synthetic, they can still fail, leading to, in the worst-case scenario, skin cancer. Therefore, I am interested in molecules that can be employed as photoactivated anti-cancer treatments; particularly ones that can be activated through two-photon excitation.

Selected Publication:

Michael D. Horbury, Wen-Dong Quan, Amandine L. Flourat, Florent Allais, and Vasilios G. Stavros, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2017, 19, 21127

Publication List:

Simon E. Greenough, Gareth M. Roberts, Nichola A. Smith, Michael D. Horbury, Russell G. McKinlay, Justyna M. Żurek, Martin J. Paterson, Peter J. Sadler, and Vasilios G. Stavros, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2014, 16, 19141

Simon E. Greenough, Michael D. Horbury, James O. F. Thompson, Gareth M. Roberts, Tolga N. V. Karsili, Barbara Marchetti, Dave Townsend, and Vasilios G. Stavros, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2014, 16, 16187

Michael D. Horbury, Lewis A. Baker, Wen-Dong Quan, Jamie D. Young, Michael Staniforth, Simon E. Greenough, and Vasilios G. Stavros, J. Phys. Chem. A., 2015, 119, 11989

Michael D. Horbury, Lewis A. Baker, Simon E Greenough, Philip M Coulter, Tolga N. V. Karsili, Gareth M. Roberts, Andrew J. Orr-Ewing, Michael N. R. Ashfold, and Vasilios G. Stavros, J. Phys. Chem. Lett., 2015, 6, 1363

Lewis A. Baker, Michael D. Horbury, Simon E. Greenough, Michael N. R. Ashfold, and Vasilios G. Stavros, Photochem. Photobiol. Sci., 2015, 14, 1814

Lewis A. Baker, Michael D. Horbury, Simon E. Greenough, Florent Allais, Patrick S. Walsh, Scott Habershon, and Vasilios G. Stavros, J. Phys. Chem. Lett., 2016, 7, 56

Lewis A. Baker, Michael D. Horbury, and Vasilios G. Stavros, Optics Express, 2016, 24, 10700

Michael D. Horbury, Lewis A. Baker, Wen-Dong Quan, Simon E. Greenough, and Vasilios G. Stavros, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2016, 18, 17691

Simon E. Greenough, Michael D. Horbury, Nichola A. Smith, Peter J. Sadler, Martin J. Paterson, and Vasilios G. Stavros, ChemPhysChem, 2016, 17, 221

Nichola A. Smith, Pingyu Zhang, Simon E. Greenough, Michael D. Horbury, Guy J. Clarkson, Daniel McFeely, Abraha Habtemariam, Luca Salassa, Vasilios G. Stavros, Christopher G. Dowson, and Peter J. Sadler, Chem. Sci., 2017, 8, 395

Michael D. Horbury, Lewis A. Baker, Natércia D. N. Rodrigues, Wen-Dong Quan, and Vasilios G. Stavros, Chem. Phys. Lett., 2017, 673, 62

Luke Hedley, Michael D. Horbury, Florian Liedy, and J. Olof Johansson, Chem. Phys. Lett., 2017, 687, 125

Anaïs Pitto-Barry, Kalotina Geraki, Michael D. Horbury, Vasilios G. Stavros, J. Frederick W. Mosselmans, Richard I. Walton, Peter J. Sadler and Nicolas P. E. Barry, Chem Comm, 2017, 53, 12898

Natércia D. N. Rodrigues, Neil C. Cole-Filipiak, Michael D. Horbury, Michael Staniforth, Tolga N. V. Karsili, Yoann Peperstraete, and Vasilios G. Stavros, J. Photochem. Photobiol. A, 2017, 353, 376

Michael D. Horbury, Amandine L. Flourat, Simon E. Greenough, Florent Allais, and Vasilios Stavros, Chem. Comm., 2018, 54, 936

Robbin R. Vernooij, Tanmaya Joshi, Michael D. Horbury, Bim Graham, Ekaterina I. Izgorodina, Vasilios G. Stavros, Peter J.Sadler, Leone Spiccia, and Bayden R. Wood, Chem. Eur. J., 2018, 24, 1

Jack M. Woolley, Michael Staniforth, Michael D. Horbury, Gareth W. Richings, Martin Wills and Vasilios G. Stavros, J. Phys. Chem. Letts., 2018, 9, 3043

Matthew A. P. Turner, Michael D. Horbury, Vasilios G. Stavros and Nicholas D. M. Hine, J. Phys. Chem. A, 2019, 123, 873

Jack M. Woolley, Jack S. Peters, Matthew A. P. Turner, Guy J. Clarkson, Michael D. Horbury and Vasilios G. Stavros, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2019, DOI: 10.1039/C8CP06536E