Dr Adam Skelton is an expert in a range of molecular modeling techniques, mostly centered on classical molecular dynamics and quantum mechanical calculations. He graduated with a master’s in Chemistry from the University of Cardiff, UK in 2002. He performed his PhD, at Warwick University, UK, in Chemistry, from 2004 to 2008 in molecular modeling of the interactions between biomolecules and inorganic surfaces. From 2008 to 2011 he started his postdoctoral studies at the department of Chemical Engineering at Vanderbilt University, USA, performing molecular modeling research on quartz/water/electrolyte interactions. From 2011 to 2012 he moved to the University of Dayton to perform research on molecular modeling of lipid bilayers and ion channelsand ab initio calculations of silica cages. He moved to the University of KwaZulu-Natal to perform research in drug design and molecular modeling of biological systems. He is currently appointed as a lecturer in the school of Health Sciences. His research interests are modeling synthetic channels in lipid bilayers, simulating the interaction between biological molecules with inorganic surfaces and modeling biological systems.

 Classical, ab-initio and Coarse grained molecular dynamics  Molecular modeling of the transport of ions through lipid bilayers and channels  Drug Design - Homology Modeling, Molecular Docking, Virtual Screening  Peptide-surface and protein-surface interface.  Peptide and protein conformation, energetics and statistics.  Surface-water interface and dissociation of water on oxide surfaces.  The interpretation X-ray reflectivity data using simulation.  Force field derivation and validation.  Electronic structure of molecules.  Reactive force-fields (ReaxFF).