Research Fellow (Lithium sulphur batteries-LiSTAR project) - two positions (074919)

Applications are invited for two research positions RA1A with a start date of 1 October 2019 and duration of 41-47 months, within the LiSTAR project.  The two posts are funded by the Faraday Institution through the ‘Lithium Sulfur Technology Accelerator (LiSTAr)’ research grant. The Faraday Institution is the UK’s independent institute for electrochemical energy storage research and skills development; with a vision to bring together scientists and industry partners on research projects to reduce battery cost, weight, and volume; to improve performance and reliability (faraday.ac.uk). LiSTAr involves close collaboration with leading researchers from University College London, Imperial College London and the universities of Surrey, Southampton, Nottingham, Cambridge and Oxford. The university research is supported by a core group of seven strategic industrial partners, together with a group of additional industrial supporters.

The LiSTAr programme aims to establish the foremost international programme on Li-S batteries; launching the UK as a global hub for this emerging technology. Li-S is amongst the most attractive post Li-ion chemistries, with notable operational, cost and weight benefits, however fundamental improvements to cycle life and rate are required to realise its potential. Using a multi-disciplinary, ‘whole-cell’ approach, LiSTAr will systematically tackle these challenges, demonstrating transformative improvements during the project. As part of the ‘whole-cell’ philosophy researchers in the University of Surrey will focus on improvements to the cathode, development of spatio-temporal models across a broad range of scales and optimising the engineering of Li-S devices.

Requirements for this post are:

A first degree in Physics, Chemistry or Engineering. A PhD or an EngD or equivalent work experience in the areas of materials science and engineering or electrochemical devices, with preferred research focus as specified below in 3.1, 3.2, 3.3. Excellent research expertise in at least two of the 3 areas below (3.1, 3.2, 3.3): Excellent experimental skills and experience in the development of energy storage materials and devices (synthesis and production of porous carbon or graphene; fabrication of electrode coatings; spraying; electrospinning; sulfur impregnation into cathode hosts; cell design and fabrication with coated electrodes or fabric electrodes for Li-S batteries and supercapacitors; testing of batteries and supercapacitors;  maintaining argon glovebox and carrying out experimental work in a glovebox). Model development at continuum level for nano/micro/meso scales (continuum ion transport model for batteries and supercapacitors; programming in fortran, C, C++; simulations). A model, in this case, means developing the full set of equations and the numerical solution for the ion transport problem. If such exact expertise is missing, we shall consider candidates with expertise of model development (set of equations) and program writing for computational fluid dynamics or 3-dimensional heat transfer (continuum level) or 3-dimensional mass transfer (continuum level). Expertise in simulations and results analysis at molecular level (DFT (density functional theory) simulations and MD (molecular dynamics) simulations). Microstructural material characterisation and physical material characterisation (e.g. using XRD); chemical characterisation (e.g. using XPS, UV/vis, FTIR and Raman techniques). Excellent record of publications of research papers in journals.

The posts will be shared between the following Departments at the University of Surrey: the Materials Group in the Department of Mechanical Engineering Sciences (prime investigator: Dr Tina Lekakou, email: C.Lekakou@surrey.ac.uk) (all areas above) , and the Electrochemical Group in the Department of Chemistry (area 3a) or the Electrochemical Group in the Department of Chemical and Process Engineering (area 3c).

Closing Date: 25 Sep 2019
Category: Research & Teaching