Water and resource recovery processes are under enormous pressure to handle increasing uncertainties related to spatio-temporal evolutions of source quality, new technological developments, changing regulatory constraints etc. Process control strategies help utilities and industries to manage their processes under these different pressures. For water and resource recovery systems (and many other biotech systems), process control practice is ruled by PID controllers which are based on simple input-output relations. The use of more advanced control algorithms that allow simultaneous control of multiple inputs and outputs as well as the integration of quality and cost criteria could significantly help utilities and industries to become more resilient and sustainable.

Assessing the probability of extreme events is of great importance in various life science applications given their potential for catastrophic impacts, e.g. in nature tsunamis, floods or heat waves can cause significant economic and human losses. While statistical models for univariate extremes are well-understood, classical models for multivariate extremes often lead to complex analyses that don't scale well when the number of variables increases and are hard to interpret or visualise. In this PhD track, we aim to build further on recent work in the field that allows more flexibility towards modelling the dependency structure in the tail of a distribution.

We are looking for a highly motivated postdoctoral researcher with an interest and affinity for process engineering and microbial culturing to work on the development of novel mixed culture bio-processes for resource recovery. The selected candidate will mainly work on the BIOPACK project, a research project funded by the European Space Agency (ESA) to assess the possibility to safely store biodegradable waste packaging material during long-term manned space missions, and its biodegradation within ESA’s regenerative life support system, MELISSA (Micro-Ecological Life Support System Alternative; Melissa Foundation). Additionally, the postdoctoral researcher will also contribute to research tasks on other closely-related ongoing research projects.

The recovery of renewable energy or production of bio-chemicals from waste streams is a key aspect in the bio-based circular economy. Anaerobic digestion plays a central role in converting organic waste into renewable energy. Despite being a full-scale mature technology, aspects such as community resilience, production rates, etc. can still be improved. The aim of this research project is to develop novel methods and approaches to improve the anaerobic digestion microbiome following the principles of synthetic biology, allowing to move this technology beyond its current limits.

Our society needs to transition from a linear to a circular model to mitigate the negative environmental impacts derived from the exploitation & utilization of materials, and their disposal as wastes. This is even more critical in Space. Long-term exploration missions will need to be (almost) self-sufficient, and all resources on board will need to be recycled in closed-loop regenerative life support systems. Microbial bioprocesses can be used to transform wastes into new resources, contributing to closing the resource loop, both in Space and on Earth.