DC9 Bio-based and organic materials for decaffeination process

https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/141124

The advertised doctoral position will be carried out at Università degli Studi di Trieste over a period of 36 months. The recruited researcher will be supervised by Prof. Federico Berti, and co-supervised by Prof. Cristina Forzato, and work in the department of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, led by Prof. Paolo Tecilla. The doctoral candidate will be registered for the PhD programme at the PhD School in Chemistry of the Università degli Studi di Trieste, Italy. The project is carried out in cooperation with the Partner Demus s.p.a., a leading company in the field of decaffeination, and the candidate will be seconded for significant periods at the industrial site under the supervision of Ph. D. Eng. Yves Clyford Desobgo, head of R&D and industrial co-supervisor.

The project will focus on the design, synthesis, evaluation, characterization, demonstration and exploitation at an industrial site of novel materials derived from biomolecules and raw waste materials from organic agriculture for the recovery of caffeine within a green and organic decaffeination process. The full characterization of the materials will be carried out. The quality of the recovered caffeine and the impact of the novel materials on the overall quality of decaffeinated coffee will be assessed. The stability of the materials will be studied in a real application at the pilot plant of Demus.

The main working tasks of the advertised position are:

(1) Optimized materials based on biomolecules and waste materials from agriculture for the recovery of caffeine

(2) Protocols for green and organic recover of caffeine along the decaffeination process

In the frame of the research project, short-term (secondment) visits at other partners premises are envisioned. As per call requirements, candidate will spend at least half of the total contract time in a non-academic environment.