CSIRO Postdoctoral Fellowship in Optimising Biodegradation of Plastics
- Are you an early career scientist with an interest in enzyme engineering?
- Use your science skills to help solve the problem of plastic debris
- Join CSIRO and kick start your research career!
CSIRO Early Research Career (CERC) Postdoctoral Fellowships provide opportunities to scientists and engineers who have completed their doctorate and have less than three years of relevant postdoctoral work experience. These fellowships aim to develop the next generation of future leaders of the innovation system.
In this position, you will work with a diverse range of scientists across CSIRO’s Manufacturing, Data61 and Land & Water business units to help address the problem of plastic waste management and pollution of waterways by microplastics. This is a big challenge due to the chemical stability of the polymers, the complexity of the materials and the scattered pollution sources.
Using your molecular biology and experimental design skills, you will investigate biotechnological solutions to these issues through the design and development of novel enzymes capable of degrading plastic materials. You will engineer poly(ethyleneterephthalate) (PET) esterase enzymes to create a pool of novel enzymes for use in a versatile range of applications from large scale industrial biodegradation of PET material to low temperature activity against high-crystalline PET.