PhD positions on Sustainability transitions through microbiome innovations

Would you like to study and contribute to sustainability transitions in food and health systems? Would you like to do a PhD in an action-oriented project around microbiome innovations?

PhD positions on Sustainability transitions through microbiome innovations

The Athena Institute of the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam is looking for 3 motivated PhD candidates to join the Holomicrobiome project. In this position, you will work on understanding and governing transitions towards sustainable food and health systems.

The Holomicrobiome project is funded by the Dutch National Growth Fund and seeks to develop microbiome innovations that can help accelerate transitions towards sustainable and healthy food systems and stimulate economic development. At the Athena Institute, we are involved in studying and supporting the governance of such mission-oriented projects.

Questions that arise are: How can we understand complex transition processes, and how can mission-oriented innovation help govern them? How can we facilitate and monitor transformative learning between different scientists and societal stakeholders? And what business models should we develop to support microbiome innovations?

As a team, we will work on setting up and running Living Labs in which scientists and societal stakeholders will shape the future of the Dutch microbiome innovation systems. We will develop and implement monitoring frameworks to assess the transformative impacts of the project. We will also develop valorisation strategies together with private sector actors. As a PhD candidate, you will be involved in these activities, and you will conduct research both on and for the Holomicrobiome project. This means that you will work in a transdisciplinary way: the project is both the research context and the research object. Based on this research and the project work, you will collaboratively write scientific articles that will form the basis for your PhD thesis.

Your duties

We expect to select a team of 3 PhD candidates that will work on a variety of topics within the project. Each PhD candidate will focus on one of the following research themes:

PhD 1: Policy and governance for sustainability transitions

• This PhD candidate will focus on analyzing the (mission-oriented) innovation systems around microbiome innovations in the Netherlands, with a particular focus on the role that policy and governance can play in supporting these innovation systems. This entails studying how policy mixes for mission-oriented innovation can best be developed and implemented, what the roles of government in transitions are, and which governance strategies help to steer large-scale projects through Theories of Change.

PhD 2: Transdisciplinary collaboration and learning in innovation systems

• This PhD candidate will focus on advancing understanding of how learning and transformative change can be organized, facilitated and analyzed in complex transdisciplinary innovation ecosystems. This also means that there is room to explore, for instance, the power dynamics between different organizations and stakeholders, how transformative change can best be monitored, and how innovation ecosystems can best be supported.

PhD 3: Valorisation and (institutional) entrepreneurship for microbiome innovations

• This PhD candidate will focus on developing strategies for valorisation, in the broad sense, of microbiome innovations. They will investigate the role of businesses and (institutional) entrepreneurs, the regulatory and market challenges these actors face, as well as the strategies that they can deploy in developing viable business models and value creation for microbiome innovations in different domains, such as human health, agriculture and food.

Within your PhD, together with your promotion team and the broader Holomicrobiome project team, you will conduct different studies. These studies will be largely qualitative and action-oriented (comparative) case studies, and their insights will also support the Holomicrobiome project. The studies will be further specified depending on the different interests of the PhD candidates and the team.

As part of the work at the Athena Institute, you are also expected to contribute to teaching (working groups) in the educational programmes of the Athena Institute (max. 0.2 fte).

Your profile

• Completed Master degree in innovation studies, sustainable transformation, policy sciences, organization sciences, management and entrepreneurship, or another relevant (interdisciplinary) social science field. Those with combined backgrounds in natural and social sciences are especially welcome to apply.
• Proven experience with qualitative research methodologies, such as interviews, ethnography or focus groups.
• Willingness to learn to facilitate interactive workshops with multiple stakeholders in the context of system transformation processes.
• Experience or interest in inter- and transdisciplinary research approaches in the collaboration between science, policy, practice and society.
• The ability to work independently as well as in a team, in a flexible, adaptive and pro-active way.
• Excellent organizational, communicative and collaborative skills.
• Excellent command of English is required; command of Dutch is highly appreciated.

As we are a growing team, we are looking for a team of PhD candidates that collectively possess a diversity of competences, that can work well together and with the other staff members.

We realise that each individual brings a unique set of skills, expertise and mindset. Therefore we are happy to invite anyone who recognises themselves in the profile, even if you do not meet all the requirements.

What we offer

• A challenging position in a socially engaged organisation.
• A position for at least 1 FTE. Your employment contract will initially last 1 year. Afterwards, the possibility of expansion exists.
• Solid pension scheme (ABP).
• Child daycare facilities available on campus.
• The possibility to work partly from home.

About the Athena Institute

The Athena Institute addresses complex societal issues, such as the intertwinement between health challenges, food, agriculture and climate change, with an eye for social injustice. We do this by designing, facilitating and studying multi-stakeholder processes. Together with all actors involved, we investigate how to instigate system transformation. Given this collaborative approach to scientific work at Athena, we cherish a research culture that is built on ‘shared science’, characterized by co-creation, open academic exchange and joint publications with our academic staff and where applicable with non-academic research partners. We are looking for a candidate who is motivated to actively contribute to this collaborative environment.

Faculty of Science

Working at the Faculty of Science means collaborating with students, lecturers and researchers who are focused on their field, yet have a broad view of the world. We are proud of a positive and inclusive workplace culture within the faculty, where we work together with great energy and a pragmatic attitude to tackle social challenges. At the Faculty of Science, scientists and students work on fundamental and complex societal issues for a sustainable, healthy and just future.