Post-doctoral position at University of Granada: Apply for an Athenea3i-2018 Research Fellowship at the Department of Applied Physics

Professor Juan de Vicente, from the Department of Applied Physics at the University of Granada, welcomes postdoctoral candidates interested in applying for an Athenea3i Research Fellowship in 2018 at this University. The information about the Fellowship conditions, how to apply, Eligibility Criteria, Selection Process, Evaluation Process, etc. is available in https://athenea3i.ugr.es/. Please note that applicants must comply with the Eligibility Criteria (https://athenea3i.ugr.es/?page_id=23).  

Brief description of the institution:

The University of Granada (UGR), founded in 1531, is one of the largest and most important universities in Spain. It serves more than 60000 students per year, including many foreign students, as UGR is the leader host institution in the Erasmus program. UGR, featuring 3650 professors and more than 2000 auxiliary personnel, offers a total of 75 degrees through its 112 departments and 28 centers.

UGR is also a leading institution in research, located in the top 5/10 of Spanish universities by a variety of ranking criteria, such as national R&D projects, fellowships awarded, publications, or international funding. UGR is one of the few Spanish Universities listed in the Shanghai Top 500 ranking (http://www.arwu.org/), and it is also well recognized for its web presence (http://www.4icu.org/top200/).

Internationally, we bet decidedly by our participation in the calls of H2020, both at partner and coordination. For the duration of the Seventh Framework Programme, the UGR has obtained a total of 66 projects, with total funding of 17.97 million euros, and for H2020, until 2015, more than 25 projects with total funding of more than 6 million euros. Our more than 3,000 researchers are grouped into 365 research groups covering all scientific fields and disciplines.

Brief description of the Centre/Research Group

Our research group has experience in the field of rheology, tribology and magnetic colloids.

Rheology: It is the science of deformation and flow of matter. It formally establishes the relationship between the state of stress and deformation of materials exhibiting a non-Newtonian behavior (i.e., those materials that do not meet neither Newton's law of viscosity nor Hooke's law of elasticity). In practice, most materials exhibit non-Newtonian and viscoelastic behavior. Some examples of applicability are cement pastes, concrete, polymers, composites, plastics, paints, blood, cosmetics, lubricants, adhesives, food and drilling fluids used in the oil industry.

Tribology: It studies the friction, lubrication and wear of materials. It is a multidisciplinary research field with great projection, and of special relevance in the manufacture of implants, artificial prostheses, contact lenses, tires for automotive vehicles, magnetic recording devices, microfluidics, micro-electro-mechanical systems and polishing of materials among others.

Magnetic colloids: Since their discovery in the middle of the last century, magnetic fluids, ferrofluids and magneto-rheological fluids are increasingly present in everyday life. Nowadays they are used in the sealing of rotating shafts, hard disk readers, loudspeakers, immunomagnetic separation techniques, drug delivery systems, cancer treatment by hyperthermia, contrast agents in NMR, damping systems and seismic protection. Magneto- and electro-rheology deals with the study of the mechanical properties of intelligent materials with response to external magnetic and electric fields. Most applications are based on the fact that these fluids undergo fast (in milliseconds) and reversible viscosity changes of several orders of magnitude, when applying external fields. They are mainly used in torque transport devices and have found an outlet in the automotive market, since 2002 when this technology was implemented in the Cadillac Sevilla damping system.

Project description

The candidate would get involved in a cutting edge research project dealing with magnetic fluids and gels with biological applications subjected to alternating magnetic fields. The project would require the synthesis of nano- and microparticles using soft lithography, flow focusing and hydrothermal techniques. The physico-chemical characteristics of the suspensions would be evaluated with especial emphasis on their tribo-rheological properties. A new yielding model would be tested using carefully conducted tests in dynamic oscillatory shear in the magnetic saturation regime.

Research Area

• Life Sciences (LIFE)
• Physics and Mathematics (PHY-MAT)

For a correct evaluation of your candidature, please send the documents below to Professor Juan de Vicente (jvicente@ugr.es):