Academic Staff

Lecturer

Email: Shane.OReilly@tudublin.ie

Tel: +35312205587

Shane has over 15 years experience in research, teaching and public engagement. Shane’s interests and expertise centre around applying organic molecules as diagnostic fingerprints to understand what’s happening in modern ecosystems and what happened in ancient ones by looking into the sedimentary and rock record. 

Shane received his BSc (Hons) and PhD from DCU (2013), studying carbon cycling and historical marine pollution through analysis of lipids and hydrocarbons from sediments. In 2014, Shane was awarded a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Career Development Fellowship, spending two years in Massachusetts Institute of Techology and over one year in University College Dublin. Shane focused on studying modern and ancient microbial ecosystems and molecular preservation in animal fossils. In 2018, having been awarded a Science Foundation Ireland Fellowship, Shane pursued his interest in research policy and strategy, helping to develop SFI’s new strategy and contributing to national research and innovation strategies and action plans. Shane then spent three years at ATU Sligo as an Assistant Lecturer in Chemistry in the Department of Life Sciences, delivering and developing teaching across a range of programmes. Currently, Shane is a lead Principal Investigator on externally funded projects totalling over €1m in value and with the aims of coming up with new indicators to better monitor the health of soils and discovering new compounds from marine microbes that could benefit society. 

Research Group page

Research postgraduate supervision

• Yunhai Li, PhD
• Michaela Bartley, PhD
• Tsitsi Lynn Mupamhadzi, PhD
• Summaia Fordos, PhD
• Sara Finnerty, MPhil
• Hayley Buttimer, MPhil
• Mathieu Texier, MPhil
• Pearse O’Brian, MPhil, Public Analyst Laboratory
• Charles Lucas Makio, ATU Sligo (co-supervised)
• Fauzia Mahanaz Shorobi, ATU Sligo (co-supervised)
• Patricia Warren, ATU Sligo (co-supervised)

Other active research team members

• Dr. Jose Galan

Previous research team members

• Dr. Kris O Dowd, postdoc 2024-2025; now Lecturer in ATU Sligo
• Roisin Dignam, research assistant 2025, now Geo-Environmental Consultant at RSK Ireland
• Dr. Paloma Campos Díaz de Mayorga, visiting researcher 2025, Instituto de Recursos Naturales y Agrobiología de Sevilla
• Dr. Sara Remelli, visiting researcher 2024, University of Parma

Membership and other research activities

• Mineralogical Society of the UK and Ireland Geomicrobiology Network, committee member
• Geo-Bio Interfaces, associate editor
• International Society for Environmental Biogeochemistry, member

Teaching, internal and external higher education quality assurance

Currently I teach the following modules across several programmes:

• Introduction to Environmental Chemistry & Sustainability (CHEM2010), coordinator
• Fundamental Environmental Chemistry & Sustainability (CHEM2026), coordinator
• Analytical Chemistry (CHEM 3013), coordinator
• Advanced Environmental Analysis (CHEM4006)
• Advanced Analytical Chemistry (CHEM4007)
• Introduction to Forensic, Environmental and Pharmaceutical Analysis (CHEM 1304)

 

I have also taught Statistics & Classical Analysis (CHEM 2016), Introduction to Analytical Chemistry (CHEM 1015), Forensic Toxicology and Fires (CHEM 4010) at TU Dublin. While at ATU, I taught Active Ingredient Synthesis, Forensic Chemistry, Organic Chemical Synthesis, Organic Chemistry, Introductory Chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry and Chemistry and Chemical Hazards.

From 2022 and 2025, I was External Examiner for Dundalk Institute of Technology for Bachelor of Science  (Honours) in Science with 2 Award options: Biopharmaceutical Science / Environmental Bioscience and the Bachelor of Science in Pharmaceutical Science.

 

Active research projects