Call For Expression Of Interest For Msca Postdoctoral Fellowships At Unige – N. 29 Numerical An[] GENOVA

Call For Expression Of Interest For Msca Postdoctoral Fellowships At Unige – N. 29 Numerical An[]
Genova
Liguria, GENOVA

Department of Mechanical, Energy, Management and Transport Engineering - DIME Call for Expression of Interest for a joint application under the upcoming Call for MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2025 University of Genoa, UNIGE, located in Genoa, ITALY, welcomes postdoctoral researchers of any nationality, with an excellent track record, to apply to the European Commission Marie Sklodowska-Curie (MSCA) Postdoctoral Fellowships 2025. Our University has been beneficiary of several MSCA-PF in Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe. The Marie Sklodowska Curie (MSCA) Postdoctoral Fellowship is one of funding schemes of the European Commission's Horizon Europe Research & Innovation programme, dedicated to excellent research promoting international mobility, as well as interdisciplinary and intersectoral exchanges. MSCA fellowship grant provides a competitive salary plus mobility and family allowances if applicable, as well as a contribution to cover research, training and networking costs. The research projects will have 2- or 3-years duration. Selected candidates will be provided with special support for proposal writing and development. The University of Genoa will organize in May the fifth edition of the Masterclass MSCAUniGe. Selected candidate researchers will have the opportunity to attend a 2-days online intensive training and coaching course on how to write a successful proposal. This masterclass is a pathway of support to candidates and their supervisors in preparing project proposals, including prescreening activity of the draft proposals and the organisation of dedicated B2B meetings, by the European Research Office of UniGe, National Contact Point and other experts. The masterclass will take place on May and June 2025 , with the first training session scheduled on the 8th May 2025 afternoon. MSCA domain: Information Science and Engineering (ENG); Environmental and Geosciences (ENV); Physics (PHY) Research Project Description The project aims to tackle the challenge of developing a prototype of an acoustic refrigerator starting from its initial design, also with the aid of 3D printed parts, such as the stacks. This will need to take into account a significant number of factors, and initial optimization can be achieved through the DeltaEC software (Design Environment for Low-amplitude ThermoAcoustic Energy Conversion). This software, freely available from the Los Alamos National Laboratory, is considered state-of-the-art for thermoacoustic simulation, capable of both predicting the performance of a specific thermoacoustic device and allowing the user to design a device to achieve desired performance. In the initial phase, it is planned to use air as the working fluid and atmospheric pressure. Although it is known that inert gases are the most performant fluids, and that higher working pressure leads to higher refrigerator performance, most studies related to the analysis of relationships between components, design, and operating conditions use air at atmospheric pressure as the working fluid. This choice is also dictated by the fact that a high working pressure results in the need for a stack with very small microchannels, difficult to manufacture, and forces the choice of a resonator constructed of a material with very high mechanical resistance, both constraints preferably avoidable in the phase of realizing a first prototype. Specific local thermoacoustic or fluid dynamic aspects can be analyzed using software licenses already held by the department, such as COMSOL Multiphysics (finite element method), FLUENT (finite volume method), or with the aid of free software using the Lattice Boltzmann Method (Palabos, LBMsim, etc. ). Following the preliminary design, a first prototype will be built and its performance verified. After comparing the data previously calculated via DeltaEC with the data measured on the prototype, any necessary improvements will be made, and then the optimization phase can proceed, particularly focusing on the stack. Having precise constraints in terms of resonator geometry at this point, adjustments can be made to the sound source, stack position, its geometry, and the material it is made of, bearing in mind that desired properties in a stack dedicated to an acoustic refrigerator are low thermal conductivity and high thermal capacity. The supervisor has already worked on the topic in collaboration with the École nationale des travaux publics de l'État (Lyon, France), leading to the finding that some materials typically used for 3D printing and additive manufacturing have excellent properties if used to print stacks (see https://doi. org/10. 1016/j. ijrefrig. 2022. 10. 007 as an example). Following this phase where the prototype properties have been maximized, it will be made operationally autonomous by integrating and programming a microcontroller (based, for example, on open technologies such as Raspberry Pi) capable of independently managing the start-up of the refrigerator, generating the sound wave at the required operating frequency, and providing output of the quantities of interest for research and performance evaluations of the device itself. Because acoustic refrigeration is inherently less efficient than conventional technologies, the use of waste heat is a key factor in implementing this alternative refrigeration technology. The potential savings of environmentally harmful compounds in cases where waste heat is abundantly available can be significant enough to justify a long-term push towards the use of acoustic refrigeration, but first, efficiency and cooling capacity must be increased for acoustic refrigerators to become a feasible substitute for current refrigeration technologies. Research Group Our research group is active in the research fields of thermodynamics, heat transfer, plant design HVAC, refrigeration, acoustics, and lighting. Regarding refrigeration, in particular, our group deals with innovative technologies such as thermoacoustic refrigeration and magnetic refrigeration. Several Professors, researchers, grant researchers, and Ph. D. students of various nationalities are involved, leading the applicant to be involved in an international multi-disciplinary research group, which can also take advantage of the presence of cutting-edge software, computing resources, and labs. Your file should contain the following elements: For MSCA-PF 25 call (opening foreseen on 9th April 2025), at the deadline for the submission of proposals (10th September 2025) postdoctoral candidates shall have a maximum of 8 years of postdoctoral research experience and must not have resided or carried out their main activities in Italy (for European Fellowship) or in the Third Country of the outgoing phase (for Global Fellowship) for more than 12 months in the 3 years immediately prior to the abovementioned deadline. More info on MSCA PF at the following link: J-18808-Ljbffr