About the centre

Sharon is Professor of Design & Materials, and Director of the RCA’s Materials Science Research Centre. She is responsible for the intellectual and strategic leadership of the Centre, raising research funding, management of staff members, and management of labs. She contributes to cross-College business through a number of committees.

Dr Bruna Petreca is Reader in Human Experience and Materials at the Materials Science Research Centre. She works in the integration of human experience into new areas of materials development: circular economy, digital environments, on-site/on-demand manufacture, human health and wellbeing. Currently, she leads ground-breaking research to deliver new circular fashion-textile experiences and innovative digital tools as the Consumer Experience strand lead in the UKRI Interdisciplinary Textiles Circularity Centre and as Co-I in the EPSRC Consumer Experience Digital Tools for Dematerialisation for the Circular Economy project.

Miriam is the Senior Research Fellow in Materials Circularity for Distributed Manufacture of the Materials Science Research Centre (MSRC) and she leads the Materials Circularity research strand of the Textiles Circularity Centre (TCC). Her research transforms biomaterial design practices within circular and regenerative socio-ecological systems. She nurtures interdisciplinary collaborations with academic and industry partners that integrate circular design, materials science, biological sciences, advanced manufacturing, and environmental sciences.