Post-Doc position

684_25_CASE_PTG_R2

Post-Doc position (R2) - High-fidelity Multiphysics modelling for battery cells and systems

Thursday, 27 November, 2025

Reference: 684_25_CASE_PTG_R2

Job title: Post-Doc position (R2) - High-fidelity Multiphysics modelling for battery cells and systems

About BSC

The Barcelona Supercomputing Center - Centro Nacional de Supercomputación (BSC-CNS) is the leading supercomputing center in Spain. It houses MareNostrum, one of the most powerful supercomputers in Europe, was a founding and hosting member of the former European HPC infrastructure PRACE (Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe), and is now hosting entity for EuroHPC JU, the Joint Undertaking that leads large-scale investments and HPC provision in Europe. The mission of BSC is to research, develop and manage information technologies in order to facilitate scientific progress. BSC combines HPC service provision and R&D into both computer and computational science (life, earth and engineering sciences) under one roof, and currently has over 1000 staff from 60 countries.

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We are particularly interested for this role in the strengths and lived experiences of women and underrepresented groups to help us avoid perpetuating biases and oversights in science and IT research. In instances of equal merit, the incorporation of the under-represented sex will be favoured.

We promote Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, fostering an environment where each and every one of us is appreciated for who we are, regardless of our differences.

If you consider that you do not meet all the requirements, we encourage you to continue applying for the job offer. We value diversity of experiences and skills, and you could bring unique perspectives to our team.

Context And Mission

The European Commission (EC) is fully committed to addressing climate change, the greatest challenge of our time. Accordingly, many initiatives and reforms have been launched to achieve a climate-neutral Europe by 2050. Transportation in its various forms (road, waterborne, air, and rail) accounts for approximately 25% of the EU's total CO₂ emissions. In recent years, batteries have played an essential role in decarbonizing diverse applications, such as transport and industrial activities, thanks to their long lifespan, high energy density, and strong power density. Nonetheless, internal or external faults and repeated charge–discharge cycles degrade battery performance and can give rise to serious safety concerns, such as thermal runaway. Therefore, developing efficient, high-fidelity numerical models is essential to examining and understanding the complex processes involved.

This postdoc position offers the chance to participate in a research project coordinated by VTT, the Technical Research Centre of Finland, to further advance the battery field and contribute to the development of sustainable energy technologies. VTT is a leading Finnish research institution focused on technological solutions for a sustainable society, including energy systems. In this project, BSC will perform high-fidelity simulations to better understand the complex, coupled multiphysics phenomena in battery cells and systems. These simulation data will provide insights for prototyping, design, and abuse testing to increase performance and safety.

The successful candidate will join the Propulsion Technologies Group in the CASE Department at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC). This multidisciplinary team has deep expertise in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and advanced software development for high-performance computing (HPC). The researcher will develop an HPC-based computational framework to study conjugate heat transfer and interface capturing in battery modules and packs, with a focus on immersion cooling and thermal runaway. Using BSC's Alya code, the work will (i) run CHT simulations of immersion cooling to provide design data to project partners, such as heat-transfer coefficients and volumetric flow rates, and (ii) simulate immiscible gas–oil flow inside the module with interface-capturing techniques to quantify pressure rise for design purposes. Alya already includes the required physical models, including the Navier–Stokes equations, heat-transfer models, and interface-capturing methods such as level set, conservative level set (CLS), and Cahn–Hilliard. The candidate's models will be verified and validated against experimental data from partner prototypes using state-of-the-art equipment.

Key Duties

• Develop a tabulated heat-source model for Conjugate Heat Transfer (CHT) and integrate it into Alya's CHT solver.
• Collaborate on developing high-fidelity interface-capturing techniques (level set, conservative level set, Cahn-Hilliard) for thermal-runaway modeling on HPC systems.
• Run high-fidelity CHT and interface-capturing simulations to generate data for design and safety assessments.
• Participate in project meetings.
• Collaborate with BSC researchers and all project partners.

Requirements

• Education
• Ph.D. related to computational mechanics, civil engineering, applied mathematics.
• Essential Knowledge and Professional Experience
• General knowledge of fluid mechanics, chemistry, thermodynamics, and numerical methods are expected.
• Additional Knowledge and Professional Experience
• Parallel programming for HPC is not necessary, but will be considered an asset.
• Good level in English
• Competences
• Strong analytical skills, ability to work independently and within a team and good communication and teamwork skills to work in a multidisciplinary team.

Conditions

• The position will be located at BSC within the CASE Department
• We offer a full-time contract (37.5h/week), a good working environment, a highly stimulating environment with state-of-the-art infrastructure, flexible working hours, extensive training plan, restaurant tickets, private health insurance, support to the relocation procedures
• Duration: Open-ended contract due to technical and scientific activities linked to the project and budget duration
• Holidays: 22 paid vacation days, 6 leave days for personal matters, plus 24th and 31st of December per our collective agreement
• Salary: we offer a competitive salary commensurate with the qualifications and experience of the candidate and according to the cost of living in Barcelona
• Starting date: 01/12/2025

Applications procedure and process

All applications must be submitted via the BSC website and contain:

• A full CV in English including contact details
• A cover/motivation letter with a statement of interest in English, clearly specifying for which specific area and topics the applicant wishes to be considered. Additionally, two references for further contacts must be included. Applications without this document will not be considered.

Development of the recruitment process

The selection will be carried out through a competitive examination system ("Concurso-Oposición"). The recruitment process consists of two phases:

• Curriculum Analysis: Evaluation of previous experience and/or scientific history, degree, training, and other professional information relevant to the position. - 40 points
• Interview phase: The highest-rated candidates at the curriculum level will be invited to the interview phase, conducted by the corresponding department and Human Resources. In this phase, technical competencies, knowledge, skills, and professional experience related to the position, as well as the required personal competencies, will be evaluated. - 60 points. A minimum of 30 points out of 60 must be obtained to be eligible for the position.

The recruitment panel will be composed of at least three people, ensuring at least 25% representation of women.

In accordance with OTM-R principles, a gender-balanced recruitment panel is formed for each vacancy at the beginning of the process. After reviewing the content of the applications, the panel will begin the interviews, with at least one technical and one administrative interview. At a minimum, a personality questionnaire as well as a technical exercise will be conducted during the process.

The panel will make a final decision, and all individuals who participated in the interview phase will receive feedback with details on the acceptance or rejection of their profile.

At BSC, we seek continuous improvement in our recruitment processes. For any suggestions or comments/complaints about our recruitment processes, please contact recruitment [at] bsc [dot] es.

For more information, please follow this link.

Deadline

The vacancy will remain open until a suitable candidate has been hired. Applications will be regularly reviewed and potential candidates will be contacted.

OTM-R principles for selection processes

BSC-CNS is committed to the principles of the Code of Conduct for the Recruitment of Researchers of the European Commission and the Open, Transparent and Merit-based Recruitment principles (OTM-R). This is applied for any potential candidate in all our processes, for example by creating gender-balanced recruitment panels and recognizing career breaks etc.

BSC-CNS is an equal opportunity employer committed to diversity and inclusion. We are pleased to consider all qualified applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability or any other basis protected by applicable state or local law.

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