10 Postdoctoral Fellowship at Durham University, England

Two Postdoctoral Research Associate positions are available to pursue experimental research in the field of atomic and laser physics within the Durham Quantum Light and Matter group. Both positions are funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and focus on advancing the frontier of quantum science using ultracold RbCs molecules trapped in optical tweezers. The post holders will work directly with Prof. Simon Cornish, Dr. Alex Guttridge and their research teams in Durham’s Quantum Light and Matter group.

The overarching goal of the research is to synthesise and study artificial quantum materials using ultracold RbCs molecules arranged in regular arrays to probe novel quantum phenomena in strongly interacting quantum systems. The use of molecules is motivated by their rich internal structure, combined with the existence of controllable long-range dipole-dipole interactions, long trap lifetimes and strong coupling to electric and microwave fields.

One position is part of the project “Enhancing molecular control using Rydberg atoms”, which focuses on using hybrid systems of ultracold molecules and Rydberg atoms in optical tweezers for non-destructive detection of individual molecules and fast preparation of entangled states of molecules. The second position is part of a UK-Canada research collaboration on “Quantum-enhanced sensing with atoms and molecules”, investigating the application of molecular arrays for precision measurements and quantum sensing.

The post holders are therefore expected to have experience and familiarity with the techniques used in the study of ultracold gases, including the operation of magneto-optical traps, the production of quantum degenerate gases and optical trapping using optical tweezers/lattices. They will be expected to display initiative and creativity, along with the appropriate skills and knowledge, to achieve the research goals. The post holders are also expected to work effectively both independently and as part of a small research team. It is expected that the post holders will enhance the international contacts of the group through the presentation of work at international conferences and exchange visits to collaborators connected with the project. The post holders will also be expected to aid in the supervision of graduate students within the group as well as contributing to the undergraduate teaching within the Department.

Research and Innovation Services (RIS) provides Durham’s academic and professional services community with guidance, expert advice, and hands-on support for all aspects of research and research-related work, including securing funding, working with partners, undertaking knowledge exchange, demonstrating impact, commercialising outputs, ensuring good research practice, and supporting professional development.

Within Research and Innovation Services (RIS), our Research Operations Team provides support and services for our academics working across the research and innovation life cycle, focusing on applying for and managing funding and providing professional advice on collaborations and contracts.

The Research Operations Team is comprised of three sections: Pre-Award, Contracting, and Post-Award. These sections work together to deliver a service to support, advise, and provide expertise to our academic community for our extensive and varied portfolio of externally funded projects. 

As Post Award Finance Manager, you will join the Post Award section of Research Operations leading on grant administration for a portfolio of high-risk and high-value projects across the University. 

Applications are invited for a Postdoctoral Research Associate in Computational and Theoretical Chemistry with a particular emphasis on the statistical mechanics of liquid-solid interfaces. The successful candidate will work in the group of Dr Stephen Cox and the broad aims of the project are to elucidate the structure and dynamics of complex liquid-solid interfaces at a theoretical level. The main criteria for the role are a strong track record in world-leading research commensurate with applicant’s experience, along with a PhD in computational chemistry or related subject. Experience in molecular simulations (i.e., molecular dynamics and/or Monte Carlo methods) or liquid state theory (e.g., classical density functional theory) is highly desirable. 

A World Top 100 department, the Department of Chemistry at Durham is one of the very best in the UK, with an outstanding reputation for excellence in research, teaching and employability of our students. We are an active and vibrant department, with a strong cohort of early career academics and future leaders. We hold an Athena Swan Silver Award, recognising our commitment to gender equality. Our undergraduate programmes are ranked fourth in the Complete University Guide 2025. At postgraduate level, our students come from all over the world to carry out research.

Our research is focussed around three interdisciplinary grand challenge themes: Chemistry for Sustainability; Chemistry for Health; and Chemistry for Change. Within these themes, we have prioritised eight core Research Focus Areas: Synthesis, Catalysis and Process; Sustainable and Resilient (Bio) Chemistry; Materials Discovery; Theory, Computational and Data-Led Chemistry, Soft Matter, Polymers and Interfaces; Chemical Photonics, Spectroscopy and Sensors; Drugs and Medicinal Chemistry; and Agritech and Aquaculture.

There is a strong culture of collaboration within the department and with other departments, institutes, and centres within the University, including the Institute for Data Science, the Biophysical Sciences Institute, the Durham Energy Institute, the Joint Quantum Centre (Durham and Newcastle Universities) and centres in Sustainable Chemistry, X-ray methods and Soft Matter. We have strong links with many Universities, Research Centres and Companies in the UK and overseas.

Durham Law School is one of the very best UK law schools with an outstanding reputation for excellence in teaching, research and employability of our students. Consistently ranked in the Top 10 nationally and Top 50 globally, it has been growing strongly over the past few years and now comprises a community of over 100 academics and professional support staff.

 

The Law School now seeks to appoint a talented individual to the role of Post-Doctoral Research Associate (PDRA) as part of the Horizon Europe project Enabling Circular Value Chains via Production Digitisation and Human Empowerment (ENCIRCLE). Working with the PI, Dr Stergios Aidinlis, the PDRA is for a two-and-a-half-year duration (30 months), starting on the 1st of April 2025 and based in the Durham Law School.

 

The project, bringing together a consortium of fifteen (15) organisations across Europe, adopts a multidisciplinary perspective in responsibly developing AI-enhanced and circular technologies that will empower business developers to formulate circular business cases and consumers to make eco-responsible choices. Durham’s role in the project is to conduct a legal, ethical and societal impact assessment of the ENCIRCLE technologies, ensure the integration of social sciences and humanities expertise in research and development activities and assist project partners in preparing for regulatory compliance under applicable legal frameworks.

The Chemistry Department at Durham University is one of the very best in the UK with an outstanding reputation for excellence in teaching, research and employability of its students and research associates. The Department is particularly strong in the area of Materials Research with excellent groups working on crystallography, diffraction and crystal growth – relevant to the current project.

This project investigates how we use knowledge acquired from life experience (schemas) to predict what we should see and where we should see it in real-world scene (images of everyday environments). More specifically, it examines to what extent and how predictions about scenes can be updated when schemas are not useful for or are even interfering with the current task. To this purpose, it uses high precision eye-tracking to analyse the time course of attentional selection during scene viewing. The successful applicant will have primary responsibility for developing the experimental materials (carefully controlled scene images), programming the eye-tracking experiments, recruiting participants, collecting and analysing the eye-tracking data. They will also have the responsibility to write the studies up for publication and present the results at national and international scientific conferences. The project is, therefore, ideally suited for someone who is organised, is a clear communicator with excellent writing skills and has a solid experimental psychology training basis, although a background in cognitive neuroscience or computer science with experimental research experience may be appropriate as well. There is a technical aspect to the project in the production and evaluation of the experimental materials, so the person should have an aptitude for technical work. Moreover, there may be scope for the candidate to contribute to the project’s development. Therefore, a combination of rigour and creativity in experimental design would be highly valued.

This is a great opportunity to work on a cutting-edge project which has a clear theoretical focus and interdisciplinary implications, as it will provide fundamental insights into how we explore, interpret and integrate new information from our visual surroundings into our experience. The PDRA will have access to outstanding resources including equipment, dedicated technical support, and travel funding for conferences and collaboration.

Applications are invited for a Postdoctoral Research Associate (PDRA) in cultural evolutionary modelling with a particular emphasis on examining the unique contributions of children to processes of culture change. This position is part of a larger European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant, Children as Agents of Cultural Evolution—ChACE, led by Dr Sheina Lew-Levy (Durham University) along with a wider international collaboration team. The project aims to investigate whether (1) Peer cultures evidence distinct cultural evolutionary mechanisms from adult cultures; (2) Knowledge produced as part of peer cultures helps communities adapt to social and ecological change. The successful applicant will be based at Durham (UK) and will be responsible for producing cultural evolutionary agent-based models which will then be tested against empirical data collected in diverse field sites using Approximate Bayesian Computation. The successful applicant will be supervised by the PI (Sheina Lew-Levy) an advisor Jeremy Kendal (Durham University).