Postdoctoral Fellowship (06) at University of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England

Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) have gained substantial attention from both academic and industrial sectors because of their exceptional porosity and their tailorable structures and properties. Use of MOFs in areas such as catalysis (e.g. CO₂ valorisation) and healthcare (including biomarker sensing and drug delivery) offer great promise for tackling major global challenges in energy, pollution reduction, and the diagnosis and treatment of diseases. 

This project, funded through a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship, will: 

1. build on our development of microwave flow reactor platforms for the discovery, optimisation, and scale-up of MOFs specifically targeting stimuli-responsive materials with new structures and particle characteristics;
2. deliver new understanding of MOF self-assembly processes and structure-property relationships using a range of in-, on- and off-line characterisation techniques including X-ray and electron diffraction, electron microscopy, IR and UV-vis spectroscopies, and gas sorption.

By combining MOF synthesis platforms (including one integrated with inline analysis to probe self‑assembly mechanisms) with comprehensive structural characterisation, this project will fast-track the development of high-performance MOFs and overcome challenges in reproducibility, unlocking their commercial exploitation.

We are seeking a Research Fellow to lead the synthesis and characterisation of new stimuli‑responsive metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), using both flow and microwave reactor platforms and complementary experimental approaches. A major part of this role will be the design and execution of synthetic strategies to produce novel MOFs, followed by detailed characterisation to understand their structures, properties, and functional behaviour.

Achieving an economic, sustainable and net zero ambition for biogenically derived chemicals is a massive industry-wide challenge. Most solvents are petrochemically derived, and present one of the main wastes in pharma and fine chemical manufacture. The use of bio-derived feedstocks is attractive for making replacement bio-solvents for reasons of low-carbon footprint, however their source and production methods often entrain water and new impurities that are problematic for use in pharma. Current work has shown a bio-source can be used to generate crude bio-acetone and bio-acetonitrile but both require purification before being suitable replacement solvents. The former is used widely for plant cleaning whilst the latter is used in substantial quantity for making oligonucleotide medicines. Post-application recycle and re-use of both solvents will also be investigated.  

In this project, you will develop sustainable and cost-effective methods for purifying the bio-solvents, testing low energy membrane drying technologies, assessing the purity of the solvents, investigating how used acetone or acetonitrile can be recycled and optimising protocols to help improve our understanding of the best design, economics and sustainable deployment. This will involve lab-based testing of pervaporation membranes in continuous flow and further purification of the solvent, integrating novel manufacturing methods into an intensified process flowsheet and collaborating on the development of life cycle sustainability assessments through multiple decision criteria.

The University of Leeds invites applications for a 3-year postdoctoral research position to study emission mechanisms from young stars and their disks at radio wavelengths.  

You will work with Dr John Ilee on an STFC-funded project exploring ways to disentangle emission from dust and ionised gas coming from young stellar objects.

You will join the Astrophysics Group in the School of Physics & Astronomy at the University of Leeds, an active research community covering areas from star and planet formation to exoplanet atmospheres. 

This role will be based on the University campus, with scope for it to be undertaken in a hybrid manner. We are open to discussing flexible working arrangements.