PhD in Printing of Complex Fluids

Do you have a passion for understanding complex, multicomponent fluid flows at the microscale and at very high speeds? Are you driven by the challenge of pushing technology innovation to the next level? This PhD position might be for you!

This project will explore how multicomponent fluids flows in droplets just after being created during the process of inkjet printing using piezoactuation. Inkjet printing has moved beyond printing graphics on paper, and its applicability has been demonstrated for numerous applications such as contact lenses, dental implants, electronic circuit boards, solar panels, 3D rapid prototypes, and even for printing of DNA and protein substances. These new applications demand the utmost in terms of reliability, as an imprecise deposition of even a single droplet can render the printed application useless, e.g. circuit failures in printed electronics. The state-of-the-art applications require inkjet printing to generate as small as possible droplets (few microns in size) of highly complex fluids at the highest possible rates (10000 droplets per second), while also maintaining constant droplet volumes and impact velocities (of several meters per second).

Previous studies have revealed that solid impurities in the ink can cause bubble entrainment causing cavitation or by directly interacting with the oscillating meniscus. Ultra high-speed experimental imaging and corresponding highly resolved numerical simulations have shown that this vorticity field in the fluid arises due to the misalignment of the density and pressure gradients at the liquid-air interface within the nozzle, resulting in meniscus distortions and bubble pinch-off, yielding what are known as satellite droplets. These unwanted droplets can cause direct failure or loss of performance of the final printed features. As inks increase in complexity due to multiple components, and additionally as ink solid fraction, e.g. pigments, increase, the likelihood of these impurities forming increases dramatically.

The aim of this PhD project is to gain an in-depth quantitative understanding of the physicochemical hydrodynamics governing the jetting behavior of a complex multicomponent fluid, i.e. a fluid containing multiple miscible liquids, surfactants, polymers, and colloidal pigment particles just after droplet creation.

Your duties and responsibilities include:

• develop your own experimental tools to investigate these problems at high speeds;
• create model ink systems containing multiple components similar to but reduced in complexity to industrial inks;
• explain and communicate your findings to both academic and industrial collaborators;
• working with a larger team of researchers to investigate this interdisciplinary challenge.

You will work here
The research is embedded within the chair group of Physical Chemistry and Soft Matter Physical Chemistry and Soft Matter | WUR, which is led by Prof. Jasper van der Gucht. You will be part of the Physics of Soft Matter team PhySM - Physics of Soft Matter, where you will be co-supervised primarily by dr. Uddalok Sen and supported by dr. Thomas Kodger. During your PhD, you will directly collaborate with a postdoctoral researcher yet to be hired.

PhD Position - Foundation Models for Agricultural Sciences

The Artificial Intelligence group is looking for an aspiring PhD to investigate modern self-supervised learning methodologies for developing and testing domain-specific AI foundation models for agricultural sciences. Currently, established AI models often fail to generalize in agricultural applications, especially when tested with data that is different from their training setting, even in subtle ways.

In this Ph.D. project, you will advance this research field by investigating how to develop, design, and evaluate domain specific foundation models that learn from multi-modal heterogeneous data (e.g. text, location, and images), associated with diverse applications, such as earth observation, climate, and phenotyping. Your models will be tested for a variety of highly relevant problems in agriculture, like crop type classification, crop yield forecasting, field boundary delineation, crop disease, and crop failure detection. The Ph.D. research builds upon recent advancements in self-supervised, contrastive, physics-informed and knowledge-guided machine learning, and involves designing, implementing, and evaluating multi-modal architectures especially for image and time series data. Processing and integrating multiple data modalities will also be key to the research objective of developing dynamic and intelligent systems that provide further insight into modern agricultural applications and food security problems.

You will work with an interdisciplinary and international team of experts in artificial intelligence (e.g. foundation models, deep learning) and green life sciences (e.g., remote sensing, crop modelling, and food security), within the AgriscienceFM project, which has recently been awarded by the European Commission.

Your duties and responsibilities:

• Familiarize with the state-of-the-art in self-supervised methods for developing Foundation Models.
• Design, develop, and evaluate self-supervised model architectures to increase our understanding about how agriculture-specific latent representations can be learned from multi-modal data.
• Perform large-scale training of domain-specific foundation models on an HPC server
• Disseminate the research results by writing papers and presenting your work at international conferences.
• Collaborate with other project partners in joint tasks, such as the construction of the datasets, and development of benchmarking downstream tasks, and contribute to the overall project success.

You will work here
The research is embedded within the chair Artificial Intelligence, led by Prof. Ioannis Athanasiadis. You will be co-supervised by Prof. Ricardo Torres and Dr. Taniya Kapoor.

Full Professor and Chair of the Marine Animal Ecology Group

Wageningen University & Research (WUR) is recruiting a full professor to lead the Marine Animal Ecology chair group (MAE). As Chair, you are responsible for the group’s research, education, and operational management, including finances and human resources.

The primary research and education focus of the chair group MAE is on the adaptation of marine animals to their abiotic and biotic environmental context. This understanding contributes to four societal themes: (1) biodiversity monitoring, including using state-of-the-art techniques, (2) climate change, including the eco-physiological understanding of resilience and functioning of species; (3) the effects of local stressors, including (bycatch in) fisheries, and the influence of substances such as ammonia to be used in ship fuels; and (4) nature-based solutions, including eco-based reef restoration, coastal protection, and the development of biobased and bio-inspired materials. All four themes align with the overarching research focus on biodiversity, ranging from the molecular (genetic) level to ecosystem-level. The current research increasingly contributes to supporting ecologically sustainable marine developments related to energy, food, and nature transitions.

MAE invests in science-driven teaching and contributes extensively to several bachelor and master programs within WUR. Our teaching for example includes state-of-the-art underwater biodiversity monitoring techniques and scientific diving. Of particular focus is the Bachelor Marine Sciences, which started with 100+ students in 2023, and the newly initiated Shared Marine underwater Research Facility (SMuRF), where chair groups collaboratively work on a variety of research topics together with students. The new Bachelor and the development of facilities to accommodate student research will remain a major focus for the group in the coming years.

Finance Administrator

Are you the Finance Administrator with experience in a wide range of administrative processes? Do you enjoy the challenge of working on more complex issues? Are you someone who ensures that processes run smoothly and who proactively puts forward suggestions for improvement? In addition to your financial expertise, do you also have an affinity with IT, such as Excel and Power BI? And do you take genuine satisfaction in keeping the administration in excellent order?

We would be delighted to meet you!

As a Financial Administration Officer, you will work within the Accounting Team and be responsible for Key Account Management (KAM) for several administrations.
Under the direct supervision of the Accounting Team Leader, you will be responsible for:

• accurately recording data in the general ledger;
• managing balance sheet positions;
• contributing to the balance sheet file for the annual accounts;
• maintaining contacts with the external auditor;
• supporting the Project and Business Controllers in preparing the monthly figures.

You have strong digital skills and enjoy using IT tools such as Excel and Power BI to contribute to innovation, and to improve and standardise working methods.

Location
Your main workplace will be Wageningen, and you should be willing to occasionally work at our location in Lelystad. It is important that you build and maintain strong relationships with other finance colleagues to ensure optimal collaboration and communication.

The financial administrations of WUR combine their strengths within the Shared Service Centre Finance.
The Shared Service Centre – Finance (SSC‑F) is a new department within WUR. Since 2025, all decentralised financial administrations have been working together as one SSC-F, continuously focusing on optimising and further improving our processes.

The Shared Service Centre – Finance consists of three teams:

• Purchase to Pay (accounts payable).
• Invoice to Cash (accounts receivable).
• Accounting (general ledger).

The SSC‑F operates from two locations, one in Wageningen and one in Lelystad. Representatives from all three teams are based at both sites.

Medewerker financiële administratie

Ben jij dé Financieel Medewerker die ervaring heeft met allerlei verschillende administratieve processen? Vind jij het een uitdaging om met complexere vraagstukken aan de slag te gaan? Ben jij iemand die ervoor zorgt dat processen soepel verlopen en kom jij op proactieve wijze met verbeter voorstellen? Heb jij naast financiële kennis ook affiniteit met IT, zoals Excel en Power BI? Haal jij werkplezier uit het op orde hebben van de administratie?

Wij komen graag met jou in gesprek!

Jouw baan
Als Medewerker Financiële Administratie kom je te werken in het Team Accounting en ben je verantwoordelijk voor het Key Accountmanagerschap (KAM) van enkele administraties.

Onder directe aansturing van de Teamleider Accounting ben jij verantwoordelijk voor;

• het juist vastleggen van gegevens in het grootboek;
• het beheersen van balansposities;
• het leveren van een bijdrage aan het balansdossier bij de jaarrekening;
• onderhouden van contacten met de externe accountant;
• het ondersteunen van de Project- en Business Controllers bij het opstellen van de maandcijfers.

Je beschikt over goede digitale vaardigheden en vindt het leuk om met IT-tools zoals Excel en Power BI bij te dragen aan innovatie en het verbeteren en uniformeren van werkwijzen.

Jouw standplaats is Wageningen, waarbij je bereid bent om ook eens op onze locatie in Lelystad aanwezig te zijn. Het is van groot belang dat je goede contacten opbouwt en onderhoudt met andere financiële collega’s, zodat samenwerking en communicatie optimaal verlopen.

De financiële administraties van WUR bundelen hun kracht in het Shared Service Center Finance.
Het Shared Service Center - Finance (SSC-F) is een nieuwe afdeling binnen de WUR. Sinds 2025 zijn alle decentrale financiële administraties gaan samenwerken als één SSC-F voor de WUR, waarbij we continu werken aan het optimaliseren en verder verbeteren van onze processen.

Het Shared Service Center - Finance bestaat uit 3 teams:

• Purchase to Pay (crediteuren).
• Invoice to Cash (debiteuren).
• Accounting (grootboek).

Het SSC-F heeft twee locaties, één in Wageningen en één in Lelystad. Een vertegenwoordiging van de drie teams is verdeeld over beide locaties.