"Investigation of thermal transport in layered materials: experimental characterization and simulation techniques for bridging nano and macroscale"

The PhD at the Materials Center Leoben will deal with conductive heat transport at the mesoscale. This is the scale where the mean free path of the underlying heat carriers (phonons) is comparable to the system size. Therefore, on the one hand the system is too small to establish sufficient scattering and as a result diffusive heat equation fails, and on the other hand the system is too big so that it cannot be modelled by methods resolving all the atoms (e.g. Molecular Dynamics). The main topic of the PhD is to establish the methods for bridging between the Density Functional Theory, Molecular Dynamics on the nanoscale and the heat transport on the macroscale, necessary for the thermal management of microelectronics devices. For this multiscale problem the Phonon Boltzmann Transport equation will be used. The numerically implemented simulation methods and analytical models will be validated by the newly available picosecond laser flash Time Domain Thermal Reflectance (TDTR) at the Materials Center Leoben.

What do we need?

• Academic degree (master equivalent) preferably physics, materials science or mathematics
• Knowledge in programming languages
• Interest and experience in experimental techniques
• Scientific curiosity, team skills, self-initiative
• Good oral and written communication skills in English

Your tasks?

• Development of simulation and scale bridging methodologies using Phonon Boltzmann Transport Equation
• Measurement of thermal transport in thin films by advanced picosecond laser flash
• Validation of simulation framework by experimental data
• Presentation of results at international conferences
• Writing of scientific articles for peer reviewed journals

Our offer:
An permanent employment, starting with 01.01.2018 and a gross monthly salary of €2.731,00.

Please send your complete application documents by post or email. We would be pleased to get to know you!
Materials Center Leoben Forschung GmbH
z.H.: Dr. René Hammer
Roseggerstraße 12, A-8700 Leoben
Email: [email protected]; http://www.mcl.at