About

Current: Mark currently works as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Southampton in the Faculty of Physical and Applied Sciences. His primary work is on the POETS project, which exploits a massively-parallel computing architecture on a fast communication infrastructure to solve problems amenable to high-performance computing. Mark has a blend of condensed-matter physics, engineering, mathematics, and software development knowledge, granted to him by his singular career path. Mark's list of publications is here.

A simulated magnetic skyrmion, with a diameter of twenty nanometres.

Undergraduate and PhD: Mark completed his first degree at the University of Southampton in the summer of 2012 with an MEng in Aeronautics and Astronautics with Airvehicle Systems and Design. After this, he joined the Institute for Complex System Simulation doctoral training centre. There, he completed his PhD entitled "Magnetic skyrmion research using virtual simulation environments", where he investigated the behaviour of skyrmions (see image below) in helimagnetic materials with easy-plane anisotropy, and in polycrystalline helimagnets. To achieve this Mark created a mechanism to deploy simulation software, which he co-wrote with other researchers, onto high-performance computing architectures using virtual machines and containers.

Employment: While working on his PhD, Mark worked for BluPoint Ltd. (https://www.blupoint.org), who aim to create an "offline Internet" platform to disseminate educational and other useful materials to remote communities. His work at BluPoint has allowed his software engineering abilities to positively impact many rural communities. Mark contined to work for BluPoint after completing his PhD for a further year, before continuing his academic career.

Mark is also interested in general high-performance computing, videogame design, flight simulation, microcontroller programming, and teaching. In his free time, Mark is also a keen espresso brewer and boulderer.