chemistry

Lesley Yellowlees

Lesley Yellowlees is a chemistry topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Lesley Yellowlees rather than just read about it. In short: Lesley Jane Yellowlees (born 1953) is a British inorganic chemist conducting research in Spectroelectrochemistry, Electron transfer reactions and Electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) Spectroscopy. Yellowlees was also elected as the president of the Royal Society of Chemistry 2012–14 and was the first woman to hold that role .

Key takeaways

Lesley Yellowlees belongs to chemistry; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Lesley Yellowlees to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Lesley Yellowlees from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Lesley Jane Yellowlees (born 1953) is a British inorganic chemist conducting research in Spectroelectrochemistry, Electron transfer reactions and Electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) Spectroscopy. Yellowlees was also elected as the president of the Royal Society of Chemistry 2012–14 and was the first woman to hold that role .

Early life and education Yellowlees was born in 1953 in London, moving to Edinburgh at the age of 9 and attending St Hilary's Girls' School. Her father worked for Rank Hovis McDougall, and she has two sisters. She completed her higher education at the University of Edinburgh, gaining a BSc in Chemical Physics in 1975, and PhD in Inorganic Electrochemistry in 1982. Yellowlees was the only woman graduate in her undergraduate class, graduating with a first. Continuing on from this Yellowlees began her postdoctoral research in the University of Glasgow in 1983.

Career and research Lesley Yellowlees' first job was as an administrator in the National Health Service, but after moving to Brisbane, she went into electrochemical research subsequently worked in the University of Queensland. Returning to the University of Edinburgh, to do a PhD on solar cell chemistry, Yellowlees became a demonstrator in 1986, a lecturer in 1989 and was appointed Professor of Inorganic Electrochemistry in 2005. She was the first woman to be appointed head of chemistry in the university. And is also vice-principal of the university and head of the College of Science and Engineering.

Honours and awards

Yellowlees was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2005 and an Honorary Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry in 2015. She became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 2012. and is also a Fellow of the Institute of Physics. To mark the International Year of Chemistry, IUPAC selected 25 women including Yellowlees for the Distinguished Women Chemistry/Chemical Engineering Award. She took over the presidency of the Royal Society of Chemistry on 4 July 2012 for a two-year term (she was succeeded by Professor Dominic Tildesley). The National Portrait Gallery has two portraits of her. There is also a painting of her by Peter Edwards in Burlington House, the headquarters of the Royal Society of Chemistry. Yellowlees was appointed MBE in 2005 for services to science and CBE in the 2014 New Year Honours for services to chemistry. Yellowlees holds Honorary Doctorates from Heriot-Watt University (awarded in 2012), and Edinburgh Napier University (awarded in 2016). Yellowlees was named the University of Edinburgh Alumnus of the Year 2013 in honour of her research, leadership and her work as an advocate for women in STEM subjects. In 2014, she was included in the BBC's 100 Women.

Personal life She is married to Peter W. Yellowlees, a Chartered Accountant, and they have two children.

References

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Lesley Yellowlees

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Lesley Yellowlees claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In chemistry, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Lesley Yellowlees before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Lesley Yellowlees ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Lesley Yellowlees

In research: Lesley Yellowlees appears in chemistry research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Lesley Yellowlees in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Lesley Yellowlees is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1953 births, Academics of the University of Edinburgh, Alumni of the University of Edinburgh College of Science and Engineering, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Lesley Yellowlees outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Lesley Yellowlees in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Lesley Yellowlees means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Lesley Yellowlees out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Lesley Yellowlees in simple terms?

Why does Lesley Yellowlees matter?

Because it connects several chemistry ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Lesley Yellowlees?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Lesley Yellowlees.