Soya completed his MSc degree at Chiba University, Japan, in 2014. During his master’s degree, he developed transition-metal-free one-pot organic reactions using halogen reagents. Afterward, he worked as a researcher in the advanced polymer material department and the agrochemical department of a Japanese chemical company, where he gained experience in fluoropolymer synthesis, organic synthesis, and computer-aided molecular design.

Soya is currently a first-year PhD student at the University of Leeds, supervised by Prof. Richard Bourne and Prof. Thomas Chamberlain. His research is focused on applying machine learning for automated chemical library synthesis.