Due to increased population growth and growing people's demands, petro-chemicals have been widely utilised in our daily need products such as in digital devices, packaging, clothing, detergents, tyres, etc. However, due to significant expenses, high density, non-biodegradable nature and growing environmental pollution because of these synthetic polymers/or petroleum-based products, researchers are currently looking for modest, sustainable and biodegradable alternatives sources1. So in this field, biomass and biomass-based products could be an acceptable substitute, as these materials are readily available, possesses low density, are cheap, biodegradable, contains a significant amount of cellulose, hemicelluloses and lignin; and are biocompatible2. So far, a limited number of waste biomasses have been explored to develop sustainable materials using conventional chemical approaches. However, these approaches are also not economic and eco-friendly. Therefore, it is a need of hours to explore new biotechnological processes to develop sustainable chemicals and materials for the effective utilisation of waste biomass in multiple fields3.
In the proposed PhD programme, the preliminary research will be carried out to explore waste agricultural by-products to prepare sustainable monomers and polymers for the circular bioeconomy and optimise the polymer material formulation. We will explore new strategies for the development of sustainable monomer/polymers using an enzymatically engineered biomass. The developed sustainable monomer/polymers will be analysed for miscellaneous applications, including removing harmful heavy metal ions, detergents, water desalination and organic molecules from contaminated soil/ water and nanocomposites for biodegradable packaging. A pilot production system will also be designed and built to demonstrate the concept at a larger scale. From the pilot-scale data, economic evaluations and performance will be done to confirm the advantages of the proposed monomer/polymers over traditional chemical techniques. The successful development of proposed monomer/polymers using agricultural by-products will increase waste resources for value-added products from agricultural materials, improve soil/water quality and conservation through effective soil/water treatment and reuse, and reduce environmental impacts of agricultural wastes.
The successful student will work with Prof Vijay Kumar Thakur at SRUC. The student will register at the University of Edinburgh where they will have access to the training environments of both SRUC and the University of Edinburgh. Both institutions are committed to the training of PhD students in both specific and transferable skills.
HOW TO APPLY
Application instructions can be found on the EASTBIO website- http://www.eastscotbiodtp.ac.uk/how-apply-0
1) Download and complete the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion survey.
2) Download and complete the EASTBIO Application Form.
3) Submit both to SRUC, [Email Address Removed].
A complete application must include the following documents:
- Completed EASTBIO application form
- 2 References (to be completed on the EASTBIO Reference Form, also found on the EASTBIO website)
- Academic Qualifications
- English Language Qualification (if applicable)
Unfortunately due to workload constraints, we cannot consider incomplete applications. Please make sure your application is complete by Monday 5th December 2022.