Prof Kwang Leong Choy was a Violette and Samuel Glasstone Research Fellow at Oxford where she has developed flame assisted vapour deposition (a variant of CVD) of films, before joining Imperial College in 1994 as a Governor's Lecturer. In 2001, she was promoted to Reader for her pioneering research on the innovative non-vacuum Electrostatic Spray Assisted Vapour Deposition (ESAVD) method at Imperial College London. She has been the recipient of the Grunfeld Medal and Prize from Institute of Materials (UK) for the recognition of her contribution to innovative coating materials/processes and later she has founded a spin-out company known as IMPT Ltd to exploit the ESAVD technology. ESAVD is capable of addressing the increasing industrial demand in cost-effective and environmentally friendly manufacturing of high performance ceramic films with fine structural and composition control at the nanoscale level for high value added engineering applications. ESAVD has been exploited and being scaled-up by industry for the manufacture of functional films for capacitors, selective gas separation, reforming catalyst and thermal barrier coatings for gas turbine blades, biocompatible thin films, and transparent conducting oxide films for display and solar cell applications. She has been invited to publish her work on ESAVD and edited a book on “Innovative Processing of Films and Nanocrystalline Powders” by Imperial College Press (2002).

She came to Nottingham in October 2002 to take up a Professorship in Materials. She was the research director of University Innovation Centre in Aero Engine with AVIC. While at Nottingham, her team has invented a novel Aerosol-Assisted Ion Deposition (AAID) process and developed super thin polymeric films and nanocomposite coatings with unique physical and chemical properties. The method is being exploited to put sub-micron/micron thick high performance polymeric coatings on steels to create high value added products, as well as developing solid lubricant coatings and high performance nanocomposite coatings for tribological applications, ceramic coatings and next generation multifunctional films for deicing, antifogging and anti-lightning applications in aerospace. She is working closely with numerous leading research institutions and industrial companies to exploit the sustainable and cost-effective ESAVD and AAID technologies, as well as novel coating materials for engineering applications. Over the past four years, Professor Choy’s work has led to her participation in numerous multimillion pounds interdisciplinary research programmes. These include EU, EPSRC and government flagship grants, as well as research contracts and collaboration to develop new engineering products with particular characteristics with industrial companies such as Rolls-Royce, Aero Engine Control, EADS, Oxford Instruments, QinetiQ, DSTL, BG/Advantica and IMPT. She has been the international expert reviewer for Ontario Research Fund, Hong Kong Productivity Council and Greek Ministry of Education/European Commission. She has been awarded Guest Professorships at the University of Uppsala (2001/03), Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering (NIMTE, 2010/2012), and Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) Visiting Professorship for Senior International Scientist (2011/2013).