Over the past decade there has been an enormous increase in consumers' expectation, knowledge and understanding of the quality, safety and efficacy of many products, including food, cosmetics and medicines. In particular, there has been a strong consumer preference for products made from natural rather than synthetic sources (i.e. plant, animal or microbial sources).
There is a popular belief that products derived from natural materials are inherently good and better than their synthetically manufactured equivalents. This manifests itself as a rapidly growing consumer demand for natural remedies and organic products. In turn, this has led to a need for breakthroughs in ways of efficiently producing and extracting High Value Natural Compounds (HVNCs) from materials such as plants and marine organisms.
Innovative new technologies and processes for more selective, sustainable and energy efficient separation of HVNCs are the scientific and engineering focus of this research training network. We are seeking early stage (pre-doctoral, with less than four years experience since first graduation) and experienced (post-doctoral, with four or more years experience since graduation) researchers to work on this project. The applicants may be assigned to any of the below host institutions as their base institution. Early stage researchers at the higher education institutes in the consortium will enrol for a PhD at their home institution.
Early stage researchers at the companies in the consortium will enrol at either Imperial College (London, UK) or Escola Biotecnologia (Porto, Portugal) for an Industrial Research Laboratory (IRL) degree. Experienced researchers will be based at one of the Higher Education Institutes. Applicants must not have lived in the country to which they wish to be assigned for more then 12 months in the 3 years prior to taking up their post. Salary will be according to Marie Curie action levels and the posts will qualify for a mobility allowance. IINSOL
http://cordis.europa.eu.int/mc-opportunities/index.cfm?fuseaction=dataForm.showDataDetail&obj_id=13252&obj_type=VAC
Organisation - IMPERIAL COLLEGE OF SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND MEDICINE
Division/Faculty/Department - Department of Chemical Engineering
Street - Exhibition Road, South Kensington Campus
City - LONDON
Postal Code - SW7 2AZ
Country - UNITED KINGDOM
Phone - +44 20 7594 5582
Fax - +44 7594 5629
E-Mail - a.livingston@imperial.ac.uk
Application Deadline - 30/11/2006
