PhD scholarship in Materials Design and ARC Discovery Project Next Generation Lipid Nanoparticles

This is a 3-year PhD scholarship funded by the Australian Research Council (ARC) to work with a world-leading research team in theoretical Physics and AI-driven materials design. The project focuses on developing a library of a new class of lipid nanoparticles engineered with tuneable internal structure and composition, exploring their behaviour in biological environments for applications in vaccine and drug delivery. The design rules for engineering these novel lipid nanoparticles and their biological interactions will be informed through computer simulations using high performance computing via physics-based and artificial intelligence algorithms. The research will benefit Australia economically, commercially, and environmentally through the development of high-value materials for the future benefit of the Australian biomedical, agriculture, and food sectors. The collaborative research will contribute to improved therapeutic delivery, crop productivity, nutrient uptake, food shelf life, and other applications. The computational part of the project at RMIT University will be performed in collaboration with experimental teams at Olivia Newton Jones Cancer Research Centre and the University of Melbourne. Successful candidates will learn and apply pioneering technologies for designing and characterising nanoparticles for biomedical and other applications in world-leading laboratories.