Senior Research Associate in battery lifetime prediction and warranty assurance

Chemistry
Salary: £33,518 to £38,832
Closing Date: Saturday 30 June 2018
Interview Date: Friday 13 July 2018
Reference: A2291

The Energy Storage Group at Lancaster University is looking to employ a senior research associate to work in an industry-led collaboration project. You will build an interactive digital tool for life-time prediction of batteries based on their design and the expected duty cycles. This tool will be used to support the design of battery packs for electric niche vehicles and to inform warranty assurances for these battery packs.

You will be working in one of the first Innovate UK projects funded within the Faraday Challenge: “UK Niche Vehicle Battery Supply Chain”. The project is led by AGM Batteries Ltd., the UK’s only lithium ion cell manufacturer. Further partners include Warwick Manufacturing Group, Delta Motorsport Ltd., Williams Advanced Engineering Ltd., William Blythe Ltd., and Centre for Process Innovation Ltd. Niche vehicles include sports cars, special cars, off-highway vehicles, buses, marine vehicles, emergency vehicles, etc.

You will build the tool in a co-design process that will involve battery pack designers, warranty experts, and the cell manufacturer, working backwards from their needs. Calculations within the tool will rely on (i) computational battery models, (ii) high-end laboratory tests (high-precision charge counting, differential capacitance, and thermodynamic analyses), and (iii) “traditional” long-term battery cycling using model duty cycles that are typical for the respective vehicles. The major output is quantification of uncertainty for our industry partners. Repeated validation loops on various batches will improve the accuracy of the tool over time, and it will allow further machine learning once in operation, beyond the actual funding period.

You will have experience in the design of technical devices and in the development/ modification of tools that support such design processes. The ability to work in a multidisciplinary research environment and liaise with partners across multiple institutions is essential to this post. It is an additional advantage if you have already worked in battery technology, but we explicitly welcome applications from people with other backgrounds (i.e. mechanical/electrical engineering or electronic devices).

Surrounded by three national parks and the Irish Sea, Lancaster is a great place to work and live. We are committed to family-friendly and flexible working policies on an individual basis, as well as the Athena SWAN Charter, which recognises and celebrates good employment practice undertaken to address equality issues in higher education and research.

The appointment will be for a period of 16 months, with good chances for extension.

Informal enquiries to Dr. Denes Csala(d.csala@lancaster.ac.uk) or Professor Harry Hoster, Director of Energy Lancaster (h.hoster@lancaster.ac.uk).

We welcome applications from people in all diversity groups.

Further details:

Please note: unless specified otherwise in the advert, all advertised roles are UK based.

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