13 Postdoctoral Fellowship at Lund University, Scania, Sweden

We are looking for a motivated Postdoctoral research fellow for a unique project aiming to develop an immunomodulatory treatment against cardiac inflammation, by targeting the pro-inflammatory alarmin S100A8/A9. More information about the treatment can be found in our recent publications in the European Heart Journal (Marinkovic et al, 2019) and Circulation Research (Marinkovic et al, 2020). The treatment has recently been highlighted in Nature Reviews in Immunology as one of the most promising up-and-coming anti-inflammatory therapies in myocardial infarction. In-vivo and in-vitro experiments will be performed to define the underlying immunopathological mechanisms and to develop a possible therapy for patients. The position offers a great opportunity to be involved in a project with high potential for future clinical applicability.

Postdoc 1

The post-doctoral researcher, within the theoretical frame of the Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg (MMW)-funded project entitled ‘Lessons from the Covid-19 pandemic in future crises’, will undertake a comparative study of the Nordic countries (Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden) focusing on emergencies laws (if any) in this comparative setting, as well as the related case law and policy developments to bring a better understanding of the concept of ‘emergency’ in action, with special regard to the Covid-19 pandemic and to the climate emergency.

The MMW project is based on EU law and comparative constitutional law. It aims to better understand the legal conceptualisation of ‘emergencies’, and focusing on the Covid-19 emergency, identify political and legal constitutional safeguards accompanying these in the mentioned jurisdictions. Based on the findings, the aim is to identify possible ‘best practices’ to be applied in times of emergencies, and in the case of this project, with special regard to the climate emergency.

More specifically, the post-doctoral researcher will be required to take on four tasks:

To study emergency laws and their application against an EU constitutional-law framework, focusing on four major Scandinavian countries: Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden.
To map the legal risks posed by emergency laws to human rights and the rule of law.
To highlight best political and legal practices, focusing on the Nordic countries.
To propose emergency rules based on the best practices developed in (c) to deal with other emergencies, primarily climate change.

Postdoc 2

The post-doctoral researcher, within the theoretical frame of the Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg (MMW)-funded project entitled ‘Lessons from the Covid-19 pandemic in future crises’, will undertake a comparative study of the concept of ‘emergency’. The research will encompass the study of Covid-19 measures in at least two Member States, with preference for Germany and France, against the national constitutional law setting, as well as that of EU law.

The MMW project is based on EU law and comparative constitutional law. It aims to better understand political and legal constitutional safeguards accompanying Covid-19 emergency measures in a selection of jurisdictions, and based on the findings, identify best practices to be applied in emergencies, especially in climate emergency. By drawing on best political and legal practices as rule of law safeguards in emergency measures, this project will propose ways in which states can act on the climate crises as a matter of urgency. More specifically, we take on four tasks:

To study emergency laws and their application against an EU constitutional-law framework, focusing on at least two EU Member States (with preference for Germany and France.
To map the legal risks posed by emergency laws to human rights and the rule of law.
To highlight best political and legal practices, focusing on the Nordic countries.
To propose emergency rules based on the best practices developed in (c) to deal with other emergencies, primarily climate change.

Natural resources often play a key role in fuelling, financing and prolonging armed conflicts. Also, the end of an armed conflict may open up many previously inaccessible areas for exploitation and development, often involving foreign investments, which may endanger biodiversity and fresh water resources. At the same time, environmental restoration projects can play an essential role in peacebuilding by serving as confidence-building tools to promote cooperation between the former belligerents as well as with the affected communities. Hence, it is essential to integrate environmental concerns in peacebuilding strategies. This is the idea underlying the concept of ‘environmental peacebuilding’ which has two interconnected objectives: 1) to reduce conflict risks associated with natural resources and environmental factors; and 2) to enable societies to benefit fully of their environment and natural resources. Existing scholarship has provided important insights into the challenges from environmental peacebuilding and how these can be addressed, in particular the essential role of international law in such processes. 

The main responsibility of the postdoctoral fellow is to map the evolving global institutional landscape in the biodiversity and climate policy domains and conduct theory-guided empirical research on the integration, legitimacy, and effectiveness of institutional responses to the twin environmental crisis. The postdoctoral fellow works together with Thomas Hickmann and other researchers at the department of political science and within the BECC consortium as well as related institutes. At the outset of the project, a publication strategy is developed to disseminate knowledge in scholarly journals in the field of political science and interdisciplinary outlets. Public outreach is envisaged through presentations at academic conferences, popular science contributions, policy briefs, and seminars under the auspices of BECC which offers numerous opportunities for networking, further education, and funding. The project also seeks to integrate key research findings into the Agenda 2030 Graduate School and the ClimBEco Graduate Research School as well as into graduate and undergraduate teaching at Lund University. 

In this project, we intend to study clay and its possibility to be used as a carrier of phosphates, for example as a “green” fertilizer in agriculture. Clay is an environmentally friendly, sustainable, and ancient material. The underlying idea is to develop a material based on clay that allows us to control and predict the release of polyphosphate. We anticipate that our results will be of great interest to society in general and the agricultural sector and companies producing fertilizers. To this end, we will combine experiments such as low-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS), Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy (NMR), and osmotic stress with atomistic and coarse-grained molecular dynamics and Monte Carlo simulations. The project is suitable for a postdoctoral fellow with experience of independent work and project management, who can work with several tasks in parallel. If it is promising and funding is available, the project can be extended to three years.

The postdoctoral position will be part of the 5-year research project “Bias and Methods of AI technology studying political behavior”, funded by the Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg Foundation within the national research program wasp-hs. The vision of wasp-hs is to realize excellent research and develop competence on the opportunities and challenges of artificial intelligence and autonomous systems with a strong investment on research in humanities and social science. The project is led by Associate Professor Annika Fredén in the Department of Political Science at Lund University together with Associate Professor Moa Johansson in the Department of Computer Science at Chalmers University of Technology. The project also involves two fully funded PhD students (one in computer science, and one in political science) and a postdoc position at Chalmers. The overarching aim of the project is to examine how the most recent machine learning and neural network techniques can develop the study of political behavior. To answer these research questions, the project employs a cross-disciplinary design combining social science and computer science methods to analyze quotes from parties, politicians and voters.

The position is situated in the Division of Production and Materials Engineering (IProd) at the Department of Mechanical Engineering Sciences, LTH/LU. The division conducts research, development, teaching and industrial collaboration in the field of materials and production engineering with projects such as on Industry 4.0, machining, digitalization of manufacturing processes and sustainable production. The subject area is interdisciplinary and is often on the cross-road of the fundamental and applied research. In the context of Industry 4.0, sensor-based process monitoring and decision making are used to generate fundamental understanding of the production processes and their optimization and to study research questions set by industry. We are interested in new materials, processes, and approaches to achieve understanding of fundamental dynamic processes in modern manufacturing. Our research group is of 20 senior and junior research personnel.

We are seeking to recruit a highly motivated post-doctoral fellow for an interdisciplinary project in microbial ecology at the Department of Biology, Lund University.  The project focuses on performing experiments in microfluidic models for the physical and chemical heterogeneity simulating soil microhabitats. The project will be conducted in close collaboration with microfluidic engineers, and microspectroscopists. You will be part of an active research group at the Department of Biology https://www.biology.lu.se/research/research-groups/microbial-ecology and collaborate with engineers at the Department of Biomedical Engineering http://bme.lth.se/research-pages/nanobiotechnology-and-lab-on-a-chip/. The cross-disciplinary environment will provide the candidate with ample possibilities to learn new skills and methods ranging from biology to engineering.

The position is placed at the Division of Solid State Physics at the Department of Physics, a division with around 100 employees where extensive research is carried out centered on various aspects of nanophysics, ranging from materials science to bio- and quantum physics to various applications. The division is a central part of NanoLund, Lund University’s large interdisciplinary research Centre on nanoscience and nanotechnology. The division includes Lund Nano Lab, a central and shared facility for the production of materials and components at the nanoscale. The Division has a strong commitment to undergraduate education, not least in the Master’s programme “Engineering Nanoscience” at LTH.

Monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) are engineered proteins that can serve as substitute antibodies in the immune system. Due to their high potential in e.g. cancer treatment they attract enormous attention from pharmaceutical industry. At the same time the formulation of high concentration injectable mAb biologics is very challenging as it is often severely limited due to high turbidity and/or high viscosity. An international consortium of leading groups has thus been established in order to perform a concerted research effort under the umbrella of the LINXS Institute of advanced Neutron and X-ray Science (https://www.linxs.se/integrative-pharmacology-and-drug-discovery). The LINXS antibody research program combines experimental and theoretical/simulation efforts in collaboration with the National Institute of Standards and Technology NIST and Novartis. Our research group at the Division of Physical Chemistry is part of this consortium, and the advertised position will allow a postdoctoral fellow to join this international effort.

The position is placed at the Division of Solid State Physics at the Department of Physics, a division with around 100 employees where extensive research is carried out centered on various aspects of nanophysics, ranging from materials science to bio- and quantum physics to various applications. The division is a central part of NanoLund, Lund University’s large interdisciplinary research Centre on nanoscience and nanotechnology.