Wiebke Drenckhan

Associated chair

Marguerite Perey Chair (2025-2027)

Wiebke Drenckhan-Andreatta is a CNRS Research Director in Physics and Physical Chemistry, and head of the Mechanics of Interfaces and Multiphase Systems Team at the Institut Charles Sadron in Strasbourg. She studied physics and mathematics in Germany and New Zealand before completing her PhD at Trinity College Dublin in 2004. After a research fellowship funded by the City of Paris, she joined the CNRS in 2007 at the Laboratoire de Physique des Solides in Orsay, where she obtained her Habilitation in 2014. In 2016, she moved to Strasbourg to work more closely with polymer specialists.

Her research lies within Soft Matter Physics, with a central focus on interfaces and the behaviour of complex multiphase systems such as foams and emulsions. By combining advanced experimental techniques, theoretical modelling, and interdisciplinary collaborations across physics, chemistry, and engineering, she investigates the structure–property relationships that govern the mechanical and functional performance of these systems. She is particularly interested in systems whose physical properties evolve through chemical reactions. For example, she has made significant contributions to liquid foam templating, where liquid foams are used as scaffolds to produce solid porous materials with tailored architectures. More recently, her work has turned towards reactive and functional foams, including liquid foams designed to catalyse chemical reactions.

Her achievements have been recognised through numerous distinctions, including the Irène Joliot-Curie Prize (2013, Young Woman Scientist of the Year), the CNRS Bronze Medal (2015), and two prestigious European Research Council grants: a Starting Grant (2012) and a Consolidator Grant (2019). She currently coordinates several large collaborative projects at the interface of academia and industry, targeting applications from sustainable polymer foams to enzyme-functionalised foams for environmental and biomedical purposes.

Beyond research, she is strongly engaged in scientific outreach and interdisciplinary dialogue. She regularly collaborates with artists and designers and is active as a scientific illustrator, creating drawings and caricatures for journals, outreach materials, and books. This dual engagement — both scientific and artistic — earned her the CNRS Medal for Scientific Mediation in 2023 and reflects her conviction that complex scientific ideas are best tackled and communicated through holistic approaches that engage imagination and multiple human senses.

Wiebke Drenckhan will hold the Marguerite Perey Chair at USIAS in the period 2025-2027.

Marguerite Perey Chair 2025-2027

The Marguerite Perey Chair in the natural sciences is named in honour of Marguerite Perey (1909-1975), a French physicist who is recognised for her discovery of the element francium. In her early career, she was mentored by Marie Curie and subsequently studied at the Sorbonne in Paris. She was made head of department of nuclear chemistry at the University of Strasbourg in 1949 and was the first woman to be elected at the French Academy of Sciences in 1962.