General information
Offer title : Doctoral student - M/F Bionics of Thigmotropic Plants (H/F)
Reference : UMR7057-CARPHI-035
Number of position : 1
Workplace : LYON
Date of publication : 19 November 2025
Type of Contract : FTC PhD student / Offer for thesis
Contract Period : 36 months
Start date of the thesis : 1 January 2026
Proportion of work : Full Time
Remuneration : 2300 € gross monthly
Section(s) CN : 05 - Condensed matter: organisations and dynamics
Description of the thesis topic
Our research includes, on the one hand, the biomechanics of organisms and filiform supramolecular structures with high sensitivity to environmental stimuli and, on the other hand, studies of bio-inspired artificial systems as well as combined devices between the living and the artificial. This project within is based on a new phenomenon recently published by our group [Dilly, 2023]. It is a “soft engine”, based on the inversion of a helix. In our research, we are (bio)inspired by climbing plants, by the flagella of microalgae, filamentous algae, or even by functional supramolecular structures like amyloid fibers. Then, we propose bionic devices, hybrids between living and artificial.
Work Context
The student intern will work on the experiments part within the MSC laboratory, both on living and synthetic systems with Dražen Zanchi and with Julien Derr at Lab. Rep. Dev. Plantes, ENS, Lyon. The thesis is supervised by D. Zanchi and J. Derr on equal level, and the work is scheduled equally between Paris (MSC, UMR 7057) and Lyon (RDP, UMR 5667).