PhD on Bio-inspired carbon-sequestered multifunctional white coatings for sustainable buildings

KU Leuven is consistently ranked among the top 50 universities in the world, and number 1 in Belgium. Moreover, KU Leuven has been repeatedly recognized as Europe’s most innovative university. Embedded with KU Leuven’s Department of Materials Engineering, the Bruges campus focuses strongly on (i) polymer processing in the Propolis research group and (ii) functional materials in the interfacial engineering research (iR) group. The iR group is multidisciplinary team of chemical, electromechanical, and civil engineers working at the frontier of materials interfaces within the domains of stimuli-responsive materials, energy storage materials, and carbon capture, utilization and storage. The group has strong collaborations with other research groups from civil engineering, materials engineering, and chemical engineering.

Project

This PhD position is part of the FWO-funded project ECOSPHERE, which aims to develop novel sustainable building materials by directly converting CO2 into functional carbonates that function as carbon-negative, high-performance fillers in coatings and plasters.
This PhD will focus on the process-structure and structure-property relationships governing the synthesis of the functional carbonates and their application in white interior coatings. The work advances a completely new class of carbon sequestered pigments that may replace TiO2, one of the most energy intensive, resource critical, and costly components of white paint.
This research combines materials chemistry, colloidal and interface science, rheology, and coating technology, and offers collaboration with industrial partners.

Profile

The candidate has:

• A European Master’s degree (or obtained before starting the PhD) in Engineering Technology, Materials Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Chemistry, Nanoscience, Sustainable Materials, or a closely related field, and ranks within the top 10% of his/her class.
• Strong interest in materials synthesis and characterization, colloid science, microscopy, coating formulations, and/or building materials.
• Motivation to work across disciplines and collaborate within a dynamic research team.
• Excellent communication skills in English, and willingness to present their research results and national and international conferences, social media, and to write research papers for publication in international peer-reviewed journals.
• Willingness to contribute in teaching activities and co-supervision of undergraduate projects
• Willingness to write a PhD fellowship proposal
• Flexibility, good time management skills and self-discipline, skills to work independently and in a team
• A creative, critical, analytical and innovative mindset
• Experience as a researcher or in industry is a plus
• Hands on experience with any of the following is an advantage: SEM, TEM, XRD, FTIR, TGA; Rheology (plate-plate rheometer, viscometry); Polymer or mineral particle synthesis; Coating formulation and characterization
• Authored or co-authored peer-reviewed publications is a plus
• Communication skills in Dutch is a major advantage.

Offer

The successful candidate will be hired as a PhD researcher at KU Leuven, one of Europe’s leading research universities. We offer a full time one year contract which can be prolonged to four years upon positive evaluation. Your main working place is the campus in Bruges with access to a large number of facilities. The candidate will have the possibility to contribute to high-impact sustainable technologies with real industrial relevant, and work within a dynamic team of excellent researchers and be supported by a supervisory team providing structured PhD mentoring.

Interested?

For more information please contact Prof. dr. Veerle Vandeginste, mail: [emailprotected].

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