The BBCE project, funded by the European Commission under the Horizon 2020 program (WIDESPREAD-01-2018-2019: Teaming Phase 2) calls for applications of 6 fully funded PhD positions, with attractive complementary training activities and multidisciplinary and international scientific environment. The successful candidates will learn how to perform the full cycle of biomaterial development, how to write high impact original research and review articles, on research metrics and ethics, quality system, experimental planning, entrepreneurship skills, intellectual property strategy development at early stage biomaterials research, on translational research and exploitation of the research results. Each PhD student will be enrolled in the PhD Program “Chemistry, Materials Science and Engineering” at RTU and will have an appointed supervisor based on the subject of her/his PhD research project (supervisors and contact persons: Prof., Dr.sc.ing. Janis Locs (janis.locs@rtu.lv); Assoc. Prof., Dr.sc.ing. Dagnija Loca (dagnija.loca@rtu.lv), Assist. Prof., Dr.sc.ing. Arita Dubnika (arita.dubnika@rtu.lv)) and Assoc. Prof., PhD Kristaps Klavins (kristaps.klavins3@rtu.lv).

Location of the positions

Rudolfs Cimdins Riga Biomaterials Innovations and Development Centre of Riga Technical University, Riga, Latvia.

International networking opportunities

The positions include participations in short-term (up to 14 days) and/or long-term (up to 6 months) training visits in world leading research centers within the network - AO Research Institute Davos, Switzerland and Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany. Yearly meetings (summer schools and symposia) of the complete network are also foreseen.

Positions start

Starting date is negotiable but tentatively between September and October 2023.

Additional information: For additional information please contact SFG1 Prof., Dr.sc.ing. Janis Locs (janis.locs@rtu.lv), SFG2 Prof., Dr.sc.ing. Dagnija Loca (dagnija.loca@rtu.lv), SFG3 Assoc. Prof., Dr.sc.ing. Arita Dubnika (arita.dubnika@rtu.lv), Assoc. Prof., PhD Kristaps Klavins (kristaps.klavins3@rtu.lv) and visit https://bbcentre.eu/news and https://vkti.rtu.lv/?lang=en.

Recruting Organization 

BBCE coordinating institution - Riga Technical University (RTU) is one of the oldest institutions of higher technical education in Eastern Europe. RTU gathers more than 16000 students, staff of 611 people for research and 572 for teaching, currently is the top 1 University in Latvia in terms of scientific potential and it is ranked among the top 651–700 Universities worldwide. Rudolfs Cimdins Riga Biomaterials Innovation and Development Centre of RTU (RTU RBIDC) is the biggest and the most modern biomaterial research centre in the Baltic States. RTU RBIDC research team consists of 30 scientists with background in chemistry, chemical engineering and materials science. The main areas of RTU RBIDC research activities include training and research on synthesis of calcium phosphates, preparation of inorganic/organic composite materials, bone cements, and upscaling of chemical engineering processes for bone regeneration purposes. Additional research fields include drug/ion delivery systems and nanostructured implant composites with drug eluting properties. The biomaterials developed at RTU RBIDC have been tested in clinical practice for more than 15 years in more than 400 patient cases.

Available Research Directions

AVAILABLE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS: Within the scope of BBCE project currently there are 6 PhD positions available in development of biomaterials for bone regeneration, more specifically development of biodegradable, osteoconductive and osteoinductive materials as well as composites and drug delivery systems for bone regeneration, with the following envisaged research groups and topics:

Group 1 – Calcium phosphates and composites (calcium phosphate (CaP) nanoparticles, nanosuspensions, granules, bone cements, CaP/biodegradable polymer (e.g. PLA, PCL, hyaluronic acid) composites, gradient materials and hydrogels (CaP/polymer) for bone tissue regeneration. 2 PhD position available on topics:

1. “Load bearing calcium phosphate composites”.
2. “3D printing and characterisation of calcium phosphate-based biomaterials”.

Group 2– Drug/ion/cell delivery (controlled drug delivery systems for bone regeneration - local drug, biopharmaceutics and functional ions, cell delivery systems (antimicrobials, bisphosphonates, growth factors, anti-inflammatory agents, functional ions and combinations of drugs/ions etc.). 2 PhD position available on topics:

1. “Injectable hydrogel/calcium phosphate drug delivery systems”.
2. “Micro and nano particulates for drug and cell delivery”.

Group 3 – Materials in vitro (cellular responses, fundamental mechanisms that govern cell-biomaterial and cell-cell interactions, novel materials for bone regeneration and their in vitro behaviour). 2 PhD position available on topics:

1. “Drug/material interactions in autologous systems”.
2. “Development of immunomodulatory biomaterials”.

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