2 PhD Positions in Spine Biomechanics

Materials science and technology are our passion. With our cutting-edge research, Empa\’s around 1,100 employees make essential contributions to the well-being of society for a future worth living. Empa is a research institution of the ETH Domain Broadly speaking, one PhD studentship will focus on Aim 1, while the second PhD studentship will focus on Aim 2, with close collaboration between the two PhD researchers and the rest of the team. PhD 1: Dynamic Biplane Radiographic Imaging to Assess Lumbar Kinematics of Lumbar Spinal Stenosis Patients Tasks will involve acquiring in vivo patient datasets related to whole body surface marker-based motion capture of whole body kinematics and novel DBRI-based lumbar spinal kinematics before and after surgery. These datasets will then be processed using our in-house data processing pipelines. Analysis and interpretation of the kinematics datasets will be conducted in collaboration with members of the research team at Empa and our clinical partners at Inselspital. PhD 2: Paraspinal Muscle Compositional Analysis of Lumbar Spinal Stenosis Patients using Magnetic Resonance Imaging Techniques Tasks will involve acquiring in vivo patient MRI datasets of lumbar paraspinal muscles. Imaging sequences to obtain muscle morphology and muscle composition, particularly fat content and fatty infiltration will be optimized and implemented. These datasets will then be processed with previously developed pipelines. Analysis and interpretation of these will be conducted in collaboration of with members of the research team at Empa and our clinical partners at Inselspital. Your profile Enthusiastic, hard-working and curious with a willingness to learn, integrate and apply principles of movement biomechanics and biomedical imaging to understand the human musculoskeletal system. Masters degree in Mechanical Engineering, Biomedical Engineering or equivalent with background in Biomechanics. Applied knowledge of medical imaging such as computed tomography (CT) and Magnetic Resonance (MR) imaging, including segmentation of medical DICOM format images and processing to develop 3D models of bones, muscles and other associated soft tissues. Knowledge of human movement biomechanics including data acquisition methods using skin marker-based motion capture techniques. Proficiency in English, knowledge of German and French is a plus Experience with Matlab, Python, XML Understanding of human 3D kinematics and kinetics Ability to work in multidisciplinary teams including engineers and clinicians Preferable Background in working with human patients on clinical and/or translational research. Excellent scientific communication skills, as demonstrated by peer-reviewed publication/s as first author and/or presentations at scientific conferences and meetings. Knowledge of applied statistics, including ANOVA. Programing in R. We offer an international, highly stimulating research environment with excellent infrastructure and broad interdisciplinary surroundings with plenty of possibilities for personal and professional development. The students will matriculate at the University of Berne and be supervised by Prof. Dr. Ameet Aiyangar with co-supervision from faculty members of the Department of Diagnostic, Interventional and Paediatric Radiology, Inselspital University Hospital, Berne.