The ESRF is a multinational research institute, situated in Grenoble, France and financed by 20 countries mostly European. It operates a powerful synchrotron X-ray source with some 30 beamlines (instruments) covering a wide range of scientific research in fields such as biology and medicine, chemistry, earth and environmental sciences, materials and surface science, and physics. The ESRF employs about 600 staff and is organized as a French société civile.

Within the Experiments Division, the Structure of Soft Matter group is now seeking to recruit a:

Post-Doctoral Fellow (m/f)
for the Small-Angle Scattering Beamline (ID02)

THE FUNCTION

You will participate in ongoing in-house research programmes, the running of the recently upgraded beamline, providing support to external users as local contact, and develop your own research programme.
Your primary role as a postdoctoral fellow is to perform in-house research and provide support as a local contact to external users. Together with beamline scientists, you will be required to participate in the development of sample environments and data analysis methods specific to the new beamline. ID02 is a high resolution SAXS/WAXS/USAXS beamline featuring a 30 m detector tube combined with state-of-the-art optics and detectors. This beamline is primarily dedicated to soft matter science and related areas of research. Current in-house research topics include dynamics of spontaneous self-assembly processes in amphiphilic systems, the interplay between microstructure and rheology in nano-structured fluids and probing the counterion distribution in charged soft matter. Some of these programs involve time-resolved investigations combined with a variety of techniques such as rapid mixing, rheology, etc. and exploitation of anomalous scattering methods.

QUALIFICATIONS AND EXPERIENCE
You should have a Ph.D. in Physics, Chemistry or Biology or a closely related subject. You should have experience in applying scattering techniques (X-ray or light or neutron scattering) to study soft matter or related systems. You are expected to have a strong aptitude for instrumentation. In addition, basic knowledge of scattering data analysis and modelling will be essential.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

The working language of the ESRF is English. Additional information about this post can be obtained from T. Narayanan (tel.: (33) 4 76 88 21 21, email: narayan@esrf.fr). For further information on employment terms and conditions, please refer to http://www.esrf.fr/Jobs/Conditions. The ESRF is an equal opportunity employer and encourages applications from disabled persons.

Contract of 18 months, renewable for a further 6 to 18 month-period. Only candidates holding a Ph.D. obtained less than 3 years ago are eligible for Post-doctoral positions.

If you are interested in this position, please apply on-line at this address: http://www.esrf.fr/Jobs.

Ref. PDID02-1- Deadline for returning application forms: 27 January 2014