Postdoctoral Openings

Currently there are two openings in the Hammond Group:

1-) Linear-Dendritic Drug Delivery Systems: Patchy Micellar Assembly

Seeking a Postdoctoral Associate with synthetic polymer and/or materials experience and a strong interest in integrating his/her skills with in vitro and in vivo experimentation as part of a team investigating new block copolymer drug, gene and siRNA delivery systems. A barrier to the effective delivery of cancer chemotherapy drugs is the transport of the toxic drug to specific tumor cells, ensuring high uptake of drug by cancer cells while avoiding noncancerous ones. One means of accomplishing this method is the use of ligand groups added to the exterior of a nano-scale drug carrier; however, much is not understood about maximizing these ligand interactions to achieve orders of magnitude improvements in efficacy and reduced side effects. By attaching specific ligands on the surfaces of drug containing nanoparticles, one can target cancer cells for chemotherapy and potentially eliminate the dire side-effects of chemotherapy. The way in which the ligand is presented on the surface – in bunches or clusters or evenly distributed – may greatly impact the effectiveness of targeting. The systems designed in this NIH funded project will enable precise tuning of ligand presentation so as to greatly enhance the ability to target tumor cells directly, thus greatly lowering the amount of drug needed. We will also investigate unique and new peptide ligand systems that enable highly specific tumor and tumor vasculature targeting in collaborations with other research groups at MIT within the Koch Institute of Integrative Cancer Research.

2-) Photovoltaic Device Assembly

Announcing a Postdoctoral Associate position in the Hammond research group in the Chemical Engineering Department at MIT. The work would be primarily focused on the selective adsorption, deposition and patterning of thin films using polyion layer-by-layer adsorption, microcontact printing, nanopatterning, and using materials systems such as colloids, inorganic clusters, nanotubes and biotemplates for inorganic systems. This work would explore the design and assembly of photovoltaic devices as part of the MIT Energy Initiative.

For all inquiries please send your CV, a brief research summary, and a cover letter indicating your research interests to hammond@mit.edu