Research Fellow (Sustainable Manufacturing)

University of Birmingham - School of Metallurgy and Materials

Location: Birmingham

Salary: £36,636 to £46,049 Grade 7

Hours: Full Time

Contract Type: Fixed-Term/Contract

Placed On: 11th March 2026

Closes: 1st April 2026

Job Ref: 107118

Salary: Full time starting salary is normally in the range £36,636 to £46,049 with potential progression once in post to £48,822

Contract Type: Fixed Term Contract to March 2027

People are central to our work, and the University of Birmingham offers a supportive, high‑quality environment with excellent facilities and a diverse, stimulating community. The IGNITE Manufacturing Hub unites five universities and industry partners to accelerate the UK’s transition to green steel, addressing the technical, economic and societal challenges of creating a circular, low‑carbon, high‑value steel sector.

IGNITE focuses on three Grand Challenges—next‑generation green‑steel products, a resilient circular supply chain, and Steel as a Service—supported by research themes in sustainable metallurgical design, durability monitoring, servitization, and optimised steel use and reuse.

The postholder involves leading original, high impact research that advances national and emerging international reputation, while directing a cross-sector assessment of green steel requirements for the EPSRC IGNITE Sustainable Manufacturing Hub. The postholder will design and coordinate research programmes, oversee a 12month programme of industry engagement, sustainability metrics development, lifecycle assessment and circularity strategy formulation, and publish high quality outputs. They will supervise PhD students, contribute to research strategy, and engage actively in knowledge transfer, enterprise, business engagement and publication activities across the School, College and University.

Main Duties / Responsibilities

The responsibilities may include some, but not all of the responsibilities outlined below.

• Develop research objectives and proposals for own or joint research, with assistance of a mentor if required
• Adapt, extend and maintain modelling, data management and cloud-based exchange systems to enable effective collaboration and delivery across the IGNITE Hub.
• Contribute to writing bids for research funding
• Collect, analyse, interpret research data through a variety of research methods, such as scientific experimentation, literature reviews, research interviews
• Apply knowledge in a way which develops new intellectual understanding
• Disseminate research findings for publication, research seminars, presenting talks etc
• Supervise students on research related work and provide guidance to PhD students where appropriate to the discipline
• Contribute to developing new models, techniques and methods
• Undertake management/administration arising from research

Person specification

• Hold a Batchelor degree in Science or Engineering discipline relevant to the project or equivalent qualifications.
• Hold, or be close to completing (post-viva) of, a PhD in an area relevant to Mechanical Engineering, Metallurgy, Chemical Engineering, Materials Science, Computational Engineering, or a related field.
• Understanding of, and ability to contribute to broader management /administration processes.
• Contribute to the planning and organising of the research programme and/or specific research project.

Informal enquiries can be made to Hongbiao Dong (h.dong.1@bham.ac.uk)

To download the full job description and details of this position and submit an electronic application online please click on the 'Apply' button above.