Fully funded PhD studentship in Dendrimer Synthesis at Monash University

Overview
We seek an outstanding PhD candidate with a background in synthetic organic chemistry to develop a new class of dendritic molecules, and to study their applications. The position is fully funded, both fees and stipend, for four years.



Project description
The successful candidate will investigate a new method for the synthesis of a library of dendrimers with variations in the sizes and shapes of the monomers, and of the strength and character of the forces between them. One aim of the project is to make dendrimers carrying a variety of functionality, and with the flexibility of the synthetic strategy, engineer the molecules for solubility, surface activity, and assembly into larger structures.

Measurement of the conformations of the dendrimers using Small-Angle X-ray Scattering (SAXS) is part of the project, and the successful candidate will have the opportunity to gain experience with this method at the Australian Synchrotron, collocated with Monash University. Computer models for the dendrimer conformations will be tested by the SAXS methods.

Monash University has Australia`s leading chemistry school, ranking 64th in Shanghai`s Jiao Tong Index. Monash is one of only three Australian universities ranked in the global top 100 for Chemistry, according to the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU). The ARWU annually grades over 1000 institutes on six objective indicators including the number of highly cited researchers, the number of articles published in the journals Nature and Science and the per capita performance with respect to the size of the institution.

Applications
Interested candidates should send a CV, a short description of research interests, and the names of two or more referees to the email addresses below.

Enquiries should be directed to:

Dr. David Lupton,
david.lupton@monash.edu,

http://users.monash.edu.au/~dwlupton/index.html.
or
Dr. Angus Gray-Weale,
angus.gray-weale@monash.edu,

http://www.gusgw.info.