PhD position in inverse modeling of electrochemical polarization of corroding steel in Zürich

The Institute for Building Materials (IfB) – Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering – at ETH Zurich in Switzerland. In collaboration with the Institute of Geophysics at ETH Zurich we seek for fall 2018 onwards a

The aim of this project is to combine computational methods from geophysics (inverse reconstruction) with electrochemical polarization measurements in order to provide the scientific basis for a novel method (“electrochemical tomography”) allowing to quantify the rate at which corrosion occurs on a metal buried in soil or in another porous medium. Localized steel corrosion is worldwide the most frequent cause for premature degradation of reinforced concrete infrastructures – such as bridges, tunnels, parking garages, etc. Furthermore, localized (or galvanic) corrosion frequently occurs in many different industrial sectors, such as in water utility systems, oil and gas pipelines, etc. The total costs arising to our society from this corrosion mechanism damaging infrastructures is in the order of billions of $ each year in industrialized regions such as Europe or North America. Despite this, all current non-destructive test methods to determine the rate of corrosion in localized (galvanic) corrosion phenomena are based on an empirical approach and have limited reliability. The novel, science-based approach of this project aims at overcoming these severe limitations of existing methods. These will broaden the array of non-destructive methods to diagnose the condition of our infrastructures.
The project will be performed in the research group of Prof. Dr. Ueli Angst at the Institute for Building Materials (D-BAUG) at ETH, in collaboration with Prof. Dr. A. Fichtner (Institute of Geophysics at ETH). The project is fully financed for 4 years, including a salary acc. to the (coverage of living expenses).

We look forward to receiving your online application including a letter of motivation, CV, diplomas and contact details of referees. Please note that we exclusively accept applications submitted through our online application portal. Applications via email or postal services will not be considered.