Albert received his BS in Chemistry from Indiana University in 2008, having done research under the tutelage of Professor Amar Flood in synthetic and supramolecular chemistry. He received his PhD from Northwestern University in Organic Chemistry in 2013 under the mentorship of Professor Sir Fraser Stoddart (Nobel Prize 2016) investigating the molecular self-assembly and template-directed syntheses of artificial molecular switches and machines. Albert then moved to Boston to carry out research in origins of life chemistry as a postdoctoral scholar with Professor Jack Szostak (Nobel Prize 2009) at Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital. As part of a unique Fellowship opportunity during this time, Albert also spent three months of the year at the Tokyo Institute of Technology in the Earth-Life Science Institute (ELSI), a research centre which specialises in origins of life research. Thereafter, Albert spent a year with ELSI as an Associate Principal Investigator before moving to UNSW at the end of 2018. Albert is a currently a Senior Lecturer in the School of Chemistry at UNSW and Director of the Australian Centre for Astrobiology.
The Fahrenbach group at UNSW is focused on nonenzymatic RNA replication and prebiotic synthesis. His group is interested in origins of life chemistry, including chemical evolution, reaction networks, prebiotic synthesis of RNA and peptides, and nonenzymatic RNA replication. For more information about his research projects, click here.