Senior Lecturer - Nanophononics and Heat Transfer in 1D, 2D and Nanostructured Systems

Euraxess research field: Condensed matter properties, applied physics, biophysics

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Expected skills:

Applicants must show a strong interest in teaching as well as a high-level scientific record in accordance with UGA’s ambitions. They must identify with UGA’s values, that is, being open to the world, emphasising ethics and scientific integrity, showing an interest in teamwork and being committed to the community. They should also have a sense of responsibility, in particular with regard to environmental and social issues.

Context and educational objectives:

Educational expectations

The successful candidate will join the teaching staff in the physics department of the PhiTEM Department. They must have teaching experience in this field at least at L1 or L2 (year 1 and 2 of Bachelor’s studies) level and will be required to teach general physics courses in the form of lectures, tutorials and practicals in mechanics, electricity, thermodynamics, optics, wave physics, statistical physics and experimental physics, etc. They may also intervene in master's level courses in Physics or Nanosciences.

• Audience: mainly Bachelor's students in year 1 and 2, participation in Bachelor's year 3 or Master's teaching is expected after a few years, particularly in the fields of heat transfer.
• UFR PhITEM (Physics, Engineering, Earth, Environment, Mechanics) and DLST (Department of Science and Technology Bachelor's Degrees), possibly at the DSDA, Scientific Department of Drome Ardèche in Valence.

Research project and scientific impact: Heat transfer in bio-inspired nanostructured and molecular systems.

Laboratory overview:

The Néel Institute is a CNRS research unit (UPR2940) affiliated with Université Grenoble Alpes and Grenoble INP-UGA. It is a fundamental research laboratory in condensed matter physics whose activities cover a wide range of scientific fields: superconductivity, quantum fluids, new materials (for energy or health), crystallography, surface science, quantum nanoelectronics, nanomechanics, nanophononics, small-scale thermodynamics, nanothermoelectricity, nonlinear optics, quantum optics, spintronics, magnetism and biophysics. The laboratory's 450 members are organised into research teams (approximately 170 researchers, assistant professors or professors) and technology centres (more than 120 Technical staff in support).

The laboratory develops and implements experimental techniques to understand heat transport at the nanometric scale. These methods rely on microfabrication and instrumental platforms available in the laboratory. The microstructured devices are based on thin-film thermometry, which is unique in the world, and local probe thermal microscopy. The scientific objectives are to understand the physical mechanisms that determine the laws of heat/phonon and therefore energy transmission at the smallest achievable dimensions (1D DNA chain, origami). Unconventional conduction regimes are being investigated, such as non-Fourier, ballistic and/or Landauer limit regimes. In terms of application, the use of nanostructured materials offers the possibility of engineering phonon flows and therefore heat flow. These effects can be used in particular in energy recovery systems to optimise their performance.

In this context, the laboratory is seeking to recruit a physicist with the skills to develop instrumentation and experimental methods for application to self-assembled materials, particularly bio-inspired ones, that will enable control of architecture at the molecular scale. The prospects may extend to measuring energy flows in living systems (tissues, cells, organelles or bacteria), single-channel conductors such as simple or complex organic molecules, 1D and 2D materials, or the study of thermal conduction at interfaces.

The research proposed here is based on condensed matter physics, but also has strong components of materials science, instrumentation, chemistry, biophysics and life sciences. These are therefore highly interdisciplinary activities that need to be developed by recruiting someone capable of developing experimental methods and projecting themselves into one or more scientific research projects at the interfaces consistent with the following cross-disciplinary areas: Cryogenics, Materials and Biophysics at the Néel Institute, drawing on the laboratory's platforms and technology hubs.

The successful candidate will be assigned to the Thermodynamics and Biophysics of Small Systems (TPS) research team.

Job details

Title
Senior Lecturer - Nanophononics and Heat Transfer in 1D, 2D and Nanostructured Systems

Employer
Université Grenoble Alpes

Location
621 avenue Centrale Grenoble, France

Published
2026-03-10

Application deadline
2026-04-02 16:00 (Europe/Paris)

Job type
Lecturer / Senior Lecturer

Field
Nanotechnology, Thermodynamics, Biophysics, Condensed Matter Physics, Applied Physics,
Optics,
Mathematical Physics,
Experimental Physics