(1) Postdoc Fellowship Position: microbiome dynamics in food model systems
Fermented foods and beverages are a nutritionally and culturally significant component of human diets globally, as well as a primary source of microorganisms and microbial metabolites that shape both food quality and human health. They also serve as an experimentally tractable model for testing hypotheses of microbial ecology and evolution. The position is located in the Institute of Food, Nutrition, and Health at ETH Zurich within the Laboratory of Food Systems Biotechnology (Prof. Dr Nicholas Bokulich). The Bokulich laboratory develops bioinformatics methods and software for microbiome research, including QIIME 2, and applies these tools to study microbiomes at the interfaces of foods and human health.
Job description
You will use molecular, deep sequencing, metabolomics, and genetic manipulation (random and targeted mutagenesis) methods together with high-throughput phenotypic screening for deep investigation of inter-kingdom interactions in model ecosystems and food matrices, in pursuit of generalizable “rules of life” that transcend these systems.
Your profile
You are a self-motivated scientist with outstanding academic qualifications, superb interpersonal and written communication skills, and enthusiasm to engage with a friendly and collaborative team of interdisciplinary scientists. You are comfortable working with a mixture of molecular biology, microbiology, and bioinformatics techniques, including experience with transposon mutagenesis or related random mutagenesis methods. Experience in metagenomics/microbiome research, metabolomics, python programming, and robotics platforms for laboratory automation are also bonuses but not required. You should also have a strong interest in teaching, and will have the opportunity to supervise thesis/student projects as well as classroom teaching.
(2) Postdoc Fellowship Position noninvasive imaging and therapy of neurodegenerative diseases
Our Lab is devoted to development of novel structural, functional, metabolic and molecular imaging systems and methods. State-of-the-art infrastructure for in vivo imaging includes advanced multi-spectral optoacoustic tomography, high-field magnetic resonance scanners, fluorescence microscopy, ultrafast ultrasound, as well as hybrid imaging platforms not available elsewhere. The preclinical phase of the project will mainly focus on studies in mouse models, with clinical translation of the methodology expected at a later stage.
Your profile
- PhD degree in physics, biomedical or electrical engineering, neuroscience or related fields
- Prior expertise in imaging methods (experience with in vivo imaging is a plus)
- Excellent scientific publication record
- Good algorithmic and programming skills
- Strong interest in an academic career
- Excellent command of English, self-motivation, goal-oriented and positive attitude
(3) Postdoc Fellowship Position Dynamic Mobile Sensing Platform (1 year contract)
You will develop and implement a roving sensor platform for gathering information on the health state of critical parts of infrastructure networks and assets, e.g. bridges, railways or wind turbines. Vehicles of different forms (e.g. bicycles, cars, train carriages or drones) are re-imagined as carriers of low-cost sensors able to aggregate a multiplicity of information on the position, direction, velocity, acceleration and other relevant parameters of structures, e.g. bridge surface conditions and/or structural integrity characteristics. This information will be primarily used for the condition assessment of critical infrastructure components.
In the second step, this data is to be fused with information received from users of the critical network (active human sensors), for decision support and rapid response to disruptions. The research methodology encompasses a technical aspect of the development of the DMSP, as well as methodological aspects of data processing, reinforcement learning and stochastic decision support tools applied to condition monitoring.
The primary advisor is Prof. Eleni Chatzi. Prof. A. Wieser (D- BAUG, ETH Zurich), as well as Prof. Loon Ching Tang (NUS) and Prof. Zhisheng Ye (NUS), are co-advisors. The earliest starting date is April 1st, 2023. Please note that the employment will be at the Singapore-ETH Centre.
Your profile
- You must hold a PhD or equivalent University level diploma in data science, computer science, information technology, civil/mechanical, industrial & operational research, electrical engineering, geomatics/geodesy, or a related field.
- Principal qualifications include strong programming experience, analytical and quantitative skills, experience with numerical analysis, particularly for structural engineering applications, data analysis and modelling, programming and ideally also high-performance computing and machine learning.
- You should be further experienced in sensor system development, sensor integration and operative data collection.
- A solid knowledge of written and spoken English is mandatory.
- We expect good interpersonal skills, the ability to thrive in a diverse, multidisciplinary environment, and the ability to present work at international conferences.
(4) Postdoc Fellowship Position: Negotiating Landscape Transitions for Net-Zero Carbon
The Ecosystem Management group at ETH Zurich is offering a two-year postdoctoral research position to explore scenarios for landscape transitions in Scotland within the frame of delivering land-based contributions to national net-zero carbon ambitions. The project includes collaboration with the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, and Bangor University in Wales.
This project aims to:
- Identify and understand the visions that different stakeholders have for landscape futures.
- Collate existing evidence on changes in selected ecosystem functions (e.g., carbon sequestration and storage, hydrological flows, biodiversity) following land cover change.
- Drawing on (1) and (2), build participatory landscape transition models to explore and evaluate alternative landscape transition scenarios.
(5) Postdoc Fellowship Position: Development and clinical translation of image-guided neurosurgery
Our Lab is devoted to the development of novel structural, functional, metabolic and molecular imaging systems and methods. State-of-the-art infrastructure for in vivo imaging includes advanced multi-spectral optoacoustic tomography, high-field magnetic resonance scanners, fluorescence microscopy, ultrafast ultrasound, as well as hybrid imaging platforms not available elsewhere. The preclinical phase of the project will focus on studies in small and large animal models, followed by a clinical translation of the new technique.
Job description
- Prototype system development for clinical use, including optical, ultrasound, electronic/mechanical designs
- Software development and testing to control hardware and enable live imaging of ultrasound therapy
- Method validation in preclinical models
- Coordination with clinical partners and regulatory authorities
Your profile
- PhD degree in physics, biomedical or electrical engineering or related fields
- Prior experience in ultrasound and/or optical imaging and therapy methods is a plus
- Excellent scientific publication record
- Good algorithmic and programming skills
- Strong interest in an academic career
- Excellent command of English, self-motivation, goal-oriented and positive attitude
(6) Postdoc Fellowship Position: Shoulder Biomechanics
The available position is funded by an independent foundation grant, with the overarching goal to establish a reference centre for shoulder biomechanics as a collaborative research group between ETH Zurich and the Schulthess Klinik. This research fellowship aims to connect the expertise of the partner institutions in clinical science, surgery, human movement analysis, experimental methods and computer simulation to better understand the mechanisms of shoulder injury and degeneration, to explore improved treatments of trauma and pathology and to establish objective measures of clinical outcome.
You will be responsible for conducting your own independent research, and for contributing to the establishment, supervision and growth of an independent research group, in the area of shoulder biomechanics. A focus is placed on the use of multi-body musculoskeletal simulation to create a virtual shoulder model allowing the analysis of shoulder loading in the healthy and diseased state, and to predict the outcome of current and future surgical interventions. You will work closely with your clinical partners to ensure a close alignment of scientific research goals with relevant clinical challenges.
Job description: You will be responsible for conducting your own independent research, and for contributing to the establishment, supervision and growth of an independent research group, in the area of shoulder biomechanics. A focus is placed on the use of multi-body musculoskeletal simulation to create a virtual shoulder model allowing the analysis of shoulder loading in the healthy and diseased state, and to predict the outcome of current and future surgical interventions. You will work closely with your clinical partners to ensure a close alignment of scientific research goals with relevant clinical challenges.
Specific duties:
- Develop multi-scale musculoskeletal and/or finite element models of the human shoulder joint
- Design and coordinate human shoulder movement studies in the Schulthess Klinik motion lab, in collaboration with the clinic’s research team
- Establish research collaborations with national and international partner labs specialising in in vitro orthopaedic biomechanical testing
- Define and supervise BSc, MSc and doctoral projects of biomedical engineering students and/or medical fellows, within the research infrastructure of the ETH Zurich
- Disseminate research results in peer-reviewed journal articles and national and international conference presentations
- Contribute to funding applications for the extension of the shoulder biomechanics group
- Communicate research results to stakeholders (clinic, public, funding agency)
(7) Postdoc Fellowship Position: Cancer Research at the Institute of Molecular Health Sciences
We seek a highly-motivated Postdoctoral fellow to lead current drug screen projects in the lab, aimed at the identification of new molecules that act as metastasis suppressors. You will be part of an international team of researchers and participate in well-funded projects at the interface between academia and pharma, in a highly motivated scientific environment.
Your profile
- Holding a doctoral degree (MD and/or PhD)
- Experienced in cancer research, with excellent publications in the field
- Familiar with cell culture and molecular biology
- Familiar with the use of in vivo models of cancer
- Not afraid of automation and large drug screens
- Excited to work in a highly-collaborative environment that includes molecular biologists, clinicians, and computational biologists
- Capable of independent thinking, ambitious, focused on discovery
- A team player with excellent communication and writing skills (English)
(8) Postdoc Fellowship Position: Experimental Quantum Magnetism
The research focus is on exotic quantum phases, excitations and phase transitions in frustrated quantum magnets. The successful candidate will synthesize single crystal samples of novel frustrated compounds and study their spectroscopic, magneto-electric and thermodynamic properties using in-house measurements and neutron scattering experiments at facilities worldwide. All research in the group is performed with a direct involvement of PhD and Masters students, whom the successful candidate will help supervise.
Your profile
The main requirements are a strong background in quantum solid state physics and magnetism in particular, as well as solid lab experience. Any additional experience with neutron scattering and sample synthesis is very beneficial but not prerequisite.
(9) Postdoc Fellowship Position: Modelling of forest development and wood production
In one of the Work Packages of this project, forest development and wood production in Switzerland will be modelled under anticipated future climate and for a variety of forest management scenarios. We will additionally assess a variety of ecosystem services under these scenarios. This will be a collaboration between the professorships of Forest Resources Management and Forest Ecology at ETH, and the Research Unit of Forest Resources and Management at WSL. The projections of forest dynamics and wood production will provide the basis for elaborating alternative forest management scenarios together with stakeholders, including a focus on increased harvesting, climate-adapted management, and segregated management approaches (e.g., plantations) to meet expected future demands.
You will work with selected case study regions representing the Swiss Plateau, the pre-Alps and Jura and the Alps, effectively covering most of the important productive regions and their differences. This will also facilitate collaboration with local stakeholders. To assess tree species’ climate suitability and growth dynamics, you will employ dynamic, process-based models such as ForClim (developed at ETH) and 3-PG (applied at WSL). The resulting trajectories will benchmark the projections of the empirical growth model MASSIMO (developed at WSL based on National Forest Inventory data). A spatially explicit forest planning model(FPS.Europe, developed at ETH) will provide linkages with other parts of the project and form the basis for interaction with stakeholders in the case study regions.
Starting from a “Business-As-Usual” scenario (Swiss close-to-nature and multi-purpose forestry) you will elaborate alternative management scenarios together with stakeholders, including a focus on increased harvesting, climate-adapted management, and segregated management approaches to meet expected future demand. The scenarios will showcase partial segregation of the provisioning of ecosystem goods and services, (e.g., intensively managed systems for enhancing timber production, short-rotation systems, plantation systems and managing for C storage). For all scenarios, you will assess C sequestration and storage potential, as well as the simulated effects on other ecosystem goods and services such as biodiversity, protection from natural hazards, water provision, or recreational services. You will evaluate the trade-offs associated with different forest cover, forest management, and wood production strategies, and evaluate exposure to risks such as fire and pest outbreaks in the productive forest area. The spatially explicit nature of our outputs allows for upscaling to the national scale, thus providing information for policy guidance on an adapted Swiss forest strategy. You will publish your results in international scientific journals.
(10) Postdoc Fellowship Position: Urban Building Energy Modelling
The objective of your work will be to gain knowledge and evaluate the GHG reduction potentials of innovative building materials across typical Swiss settlement types. Your work will be centred around building, expanding and analysing Swiss UBEM archetypes and representative buildings using the City Energy Analyst (CEA). This includes identifying the future trends in building properties, materials and building energy systems, developing the UBEMs that reflect the trends, and integrating the research outcome into the City Energy Analyst platform. Furthermore, you will expand the CEA to address lifecycle emissions from a material and temporal perspective. As part of the UBEM team at the chair, you will discuss and, if complementary, contribute to other ongoing research projects with your knowledge and experience.
Your profile
We are looking for highly motivated and self-organized individual with a PhD in engineering (with experience and a strong interest in the built environment/architecture) or in architecture (with experience and a strong interest in engineering/data science). You are required to have expertise and experience in building and urban energy modelling and simulation, preferably using the City Energy Analyst (CEA) or comparable tools. Experience in programming (Python, Matlab, etc.) or an interest to learn on the job is highly welcome. We require excellent communication skills in English, both verbally and written. Knowledge in German or French is welcome. You should be able to combine strong individual research with teamwork within the project. We explicitly encourage female candidates to apply. We offer a modern, dynamic, international, and multidisciplinary work environment, as well as a young and enthusiastic team that values teamwork.
