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We are an innovative and customer-driven advanced materials company focused on designing, developing, and manufacturing smart engineered adsorbent materials to capture and retain highly persistent and hazardous compounds called PFAS (Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) from water across the Residential, Commercial & Institutional, and Industrial market sectors.
Based in London, Puraffinity was founded in 2015 and since then has become a leading organization in globally addressing PFAS, commonly known as The Forever Chemicals, due to its resistance and high mobility.
Our Vision is to provide 1 billion people with PFAS safe water by 2030, and our Mission is to protect environmental and human health by engineering precision materials to capture chemicals in water.
Puraffinity embraces diversity and fosters a collaborative and teamworking environment, and we dedicate 100% of our time to create a purposeful and sustainable environmental impact. Our Core Values: The Environment, Collaboration, Ambition, Ground-Breaking Solutions, and Customer-Centric approach.
Why join Puraffinity
- We offer great benefits: Vitality Private Health Care, enhanced pension employer contribution scheme (up to 7.5%), and mental health coaching and support by Spill
- We offer shares in Puraffinity for all employees, which means you get recognised and rewarded for your work
- We care about your learning and development and to support this we have a generous training budget for personal development (up to £2,000 per year)
- A work life balance is important – we offer 25 days annual leave (in addition to the 8 bank holidays) and a hybrid working approach
- We have a very strong diversity and inclusion focus, and in line with this, we have equalised our parental leave and pay for all
The role
The Graduate Scientist will support the development, synthesis and evaluation of Puraffinity’s new adsorbent media concepts. You will report to the Product Development Team Leader. Your primary responsibility will be to design, synthesise, analyse and test new adsorbents.
You will provide clear technical summaries and recommendations to the Team Leader and other key stakeholders through dissemination of technical data in the form of updates, presentations and meetings.
Research and development
- Propose new work proposals for improving the performance of adsorbent media and/or furthering understanding of material performance.
- Synthesis and purification of novel adsorbent material products.
- Analysis of data from a wide range of sources (analytical, performance data, elemental analyses etc) to guide future adsorbent material design.
- In collaboration with the Engineering Team, performance testing of materials and analysis of data.
- Collect and process experimental data, analyse results and compile experimental results in the appropriate formats (Word, PowerPoint) for wider dissemination.
Quality, health & safety, the environment (QHSE)
- Adhere to all HSE protocols.
- Ensure laboratory experiments, SOPs, Risk Assessments, COSHH forms and results are clearly documented.
- Raise any HSE concerns to a member of the safety team.
- Identify new continuous improvement exercises to raise the level of QHSE.
- Propose initiatives to improve the level of robustness of data collection and interpretation.
Communication
- Practice proactive, open and transparent communication at all times with all internal stakeholders to ensure that they are aware of progress, and asking for support when needed.
- Strong communication within the PD team and across the other functions.
- Discuss progress regularly with the Team Leader and report/present results as needed, e.g. at team meetings, executive updates, review meetings.
- Effective communication with third parties when required (suppliers, subcontractors, academic or industrial partners).
About you
The ideal Graduate Scientist will have a strong sense of curiosity and bold thinking to develop innovative new material concepts. Clear communication is also key for this position.
You will be expected to adhere to all health and safety protocols. The Graduate Scientist should also display meticulous attention to detail and ensure all experimental observations are recorded and well documented. In addition:
- A bachelor's or master’s degree in chemistry or material science, with experience working within a laboratory environment.
- An awareness of material characterisation and analytical techniques.
