3 Year Ph.D position
"Ultrafast dynamics of the N-H bond and its significance towards the
photoresistive mechanism of nucleic bases and base-pairs."
A vacancy exists for a 3 year doctoral position in the Department of
Chemistry at Warwick University. The post is an EPSRC funded studentship.
The candidate must be a UK citizen or EU citizen and have very strong
interests in experimental physical chemistry or chemical physics. The
project will be supervised by Dr Vasilios Stavros. The student stipend is
£12,300 pa. The post is available from 1 October 2006.
Prospective applicants should make informal contact by email or telephone:
Dr Vasilios Stavros
Department of Chemistry
University of Warwick
Gibbet Hill Road
Coventry CV4 7AL, UK
Tel: +44 (0) 24 76150172
Email: [log in to unmask]
Project description:
Processes which involve the absorption of light play an integral role in
our day-to-day lives. Nature has carefully chosen our molecular building
blocks so that the potentially devastating effects of ultraviolet
radiation are by-passed. The nucleic bases, adenine, thymine, guanine and
cytosine, which constitute the building blocks of our genetic code, DNA,
absorb ultraviolet radiation very readily. Once absorbed, this energy is
very efficiently diffused through harmless molecular relaxation pathways
reducing the risk of molecular breakdown and therefore photochemical
damage. The timescales of these photoresistive pathways must be very fast
for them to compete effectively with the detrimental paths. The project is
two-fold: Firstly, to build an experimental apparatus which allows
introduction of the nucleic bases into a controlled environment, i.e. the
gas-phase. Secondly, interrogate these molecules with sequences of
ultrafast laser pulses and identify and completely characterize these
pathways using a combination of femtosecond time-resolved mass and
photoelectron spectroscopic techniques.
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