Job description:
The LSRE – Laboratory of Separation and Reaction Engineering – in partnership with the LCM – Laboratory of Catalysis and Materials – holds the statute of “Laboratório Associado” since December 2004. Both the LSRE and the LCM are located in the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto.
The attribution of the statute of “Laboratório Associado” was based on the verification of the needs for developing certain areas of the national industrial tissue and the will of enlarging its influence area to the society in general, realizing missions of public interest which, beyond the R&D activities, can be classified as rendering services to the chemical and similar industries, with the objective of a sustained technological and industrial development.
Information about the past, recent and current research projects in which the LSRE and the LCM were involved, together with a short description of the achieved results, can be found in the Website of the Laboratório Associado (http://lsre.fe.up.pt/).
The R&D activities of LSRE comprise the execution of national and international projects, financed by FCT and other national institutions, by The European Union (JOULE, BRITE, ALFA programmes) and by other international agreements and programmes (CYTED, ERASMUS). The LSRE counts also projects in collaboration and financed by national end european companies and industries. The outcome of the work done in the LSRE is well expressed in terms of its scientific production, with more than 50 PhD theses and more than 250 scientific publications in international journals since 1996.
Innovation and technology transfer are key objectives of the LSRE, which counts currently with four pending international Patent requests. Several works developed in the LSRE were recently awarded, including a first prize and a honor mention in the CUF Prize for the best PhD thesis and the first prize in the Solvay Ideas Challenge. Two spin-off companies originated in the LSRE were recently launched, one in the Perfumes Engineering area – the I-Sensis – and another in the Fluid Engineering area – Fluidinova.
By this announcement, the LSRE intends to hire one Post-Doc Researcher for a five years period. The selected candidate will develop research work in the Synthesis and formulation of high-added value products (Product Engineering), namely in Perfumes Engineering or in Polymer Engineering.
In the past few years, relevant research in the Product Engineering scientific area was developed in the LSRE; special attention was devoted namely to (i) Perfumes engineering, where the work includes: extension of the methodology for design of perfumes (Perfumery Ternary Diagram PTD®) to complex notes with multi-component formulation; separation of essential oils using membranes and supercritical extraction techniques; (ii) Polymer engineering, in which the following work is currently ongoing: study of the production process of aqueous polyurethane dispersions, segmented polyurethane synthesis and micro-encapsulation of several products, synthesis of polyurethanes derived from lignin, synthesis of composite materials using olive stone as reinforcement, synthesis of polyols by oxypropylation of the olive stone, development of mathematical models for non-linear irreversible multi-component polymerization processes, radical and coordination polymerizations involving reticulation and terminal ramification, prediction of the distributions of polymerization degrees and molecular masses, sequences lengths and mean gyration radius, before and after gelation, elastic properties of networks and emulsion polymerization.
The LSRE will continue to apply its efforts to these areas, namely in (i) Perfumes engineering, in which the Laboratory gave recently origin to a spin-off company (I-Sensis) with the functions of deepening the knowledge which will enable the scientific formulation of perfumes; and (ii) Polymer engineering, strengthening some research areas currently undergoing in the laboratory (synthesis and characterization of polymers, including polymers derived from biomass – lignin – and mathematical modelling of polymerization processes; in this moment, the Laboratory is involved in several national and international projects with industry and in one luso-french integrated action).
Besides the participation in ongoing projects, the activity of the successful candidate will include the supervising of PhD students and other young researchers, the preparation of proposals to R&D projects both at national and international levels, the accompanying of master projects and the participation in the management of the LSRE - Laboratório Associado.
The selection will be based on the appreciation of the curriculum vitae of the candidates and of one three-year R&D research program (maximum of two A4 pages) written by the candidates. If necessary, the evaluation may be done in two phases, the second one reserved to candidates selected in the first phase; in the second phase one personal interview, the presentation of a seminar or the elaboration of a project can be required.
The applications, including a detailed curriculum vitae, graduation certificate, reference letters, one three-year R&D research program (maximum of two A4 pages), as well as an application letter directed to the Director of the LSRE - Laboratório Associado, should be personally delivered or sent by registered surface mail to the LSRE until August 30, 2007.
Application deadline: 30-08-2007
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