A Century of Ingredients: The Chemistry behind Beauty & Personal Care Products

Paul Jenkins has worked for Unilever for 22 years. In that time he has worked on technology for numerous different categories including Deo, Hair, Household Care, Laundry, Oral and Skin.

His current role is Research Director for the Material Science (Surface Engineering) group within the Beauty and Personal Care Science & Technology Group. In this role he leads teams based in Bangalore and Shanghai as well as Port Sunlight. Over recent years, this team has supported dozens of product launches through the application of either proprietary technologies for new/improved benefits or scientific insights within product claims. His team are named inventors on hundreds of patents that protect Unilever’s product portfolio. He was the Unilever lead for the proposal to HEFCE that resulted in funding for the Material Innovation Factory being secured and he has played a lead role in growing the capability and delivering impactful innovation from it since 2015 when it opened.

He joined Unilever in March 2000 from the University of South Australia where he was a Research Fellow. There he worked very closely with the R&D capabilities of global resources companies such as Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton and Xstrata for six years helping them to understand the optimal reagent schemes to maximise recovery of valuable minerals and metals. He also worked with the printing industry to innovate in high performance inks with properties that allowed printing to occur on non-paper substrates such as glass and plastic.

Paul’s scientific background is in Colloid and Interfacial Science and Physical Chemistry. He received his BSc and PhD from the University of Bristol. He is also a Chartered Chemist and Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. He has published over 30 papers in peer reviewed journals and is a named inventor on patents that protect in market technology. He has a broad external network in both academia and with suppliers. He was a member of the Chemistry panel of the 2021 UK Research Excellence Framework assessment and also sits as an advisor on the EPSRC Physical Sciences Strategic Advisory Team.