At the Vehcle Safety Division, research is carried out with the aim of preventing injuries to the human body, for instance in traffic accidents. The research is prioritized based on accident statistics provided by the Field Data Management group within the division.

The research covers understanding of the reasons why accidents and incidents occur, driver behavior, driver reactions and the impact on the driver in different traffic situations as well as injury mechanism at the microscopic level and to the response of the whole human body during externally applied violent mechanical loads.

All research is in essence multidisciplinary and spans from the field of mechanics to behavioral science, medicine, numerical methods, sensors and signals, and image processing.

Information about the research group

The Injury prevention research group is part of the Vehicle Safety Division. We carry out research in the vehicle and road safety area. Our research group is focused on Impact biomechanics, experimental and computational modeling of traffic accidents, the vehicle occupant and protection systems. Our goal is to carry out a mix of basic and applied research within our area. We collaborate with medical expertise to improve our understanding of the human body and its tolerance to biomechanical loading in traffic accidents and we collaborate with the vehicle industry and road safety authorities to apply our basic knowledge in traffic safety systems.

We are part of the SAFER-Vehicle and Traffic Safety Center. The center is nicely situated on the north side of the river Göta Älv in Göteborg, Sweden. The centre is hosted by Chalmers and has over 20 partner organizations.
Traffic safety has several challenges ahead, of which one is how to protect occupants in the future fleet of small electric vehicles that is expected to come. Another challenge is to develop robust protective systems that take care of the full diversity of the population. We aim at creating a strong niche in human body modeling to provide biofidelic tools for assessment and development of novel protective systems, active before and during the crash.

Job description

Crash simulation using Finite Element Modelling, software LS Dyna. Use of the commercial Human Body Model THUMS in an existing vehicle model. Research involving car crash simulation in the EU-project SafeEV. The work includes model development, accident simulation, data analysis, and publication (80-90% of full time)

Teaching, Vehicle and traffic safety, Impact Biomechanics, Assisting in PhD-student supervision (10-20% of full time)

The Post-doctoral position is an appointment that offers an opportunity to qualify for further research positions within academia or industry. The majority of your working time is devoted to your own research, normally as a member of a research group. Included in your work is also to take part in supervision of Ph.D. students and M.Sc thesis students. Teaching of undergraduate students may also be included to a small extent.

The employment is limited to a maximum of 2 years (1+1).

Qualifications

PhD in biomechanics is a requirement. MSc or equal in an Engineerng subject is a merit as well as Biomedical education. Experience in Finite Element Modelling is required. Other valuable experience include structural analyses using LS-Dyna (or similar software), Human Body Modeling, Impact BioMechanics and Medical Engineering.

The applicant should have Ph.D. degree (normally not older than 3 years) preferably in the area of finite element modelling with biological applications by the start of the appointment. A succesful candidate should demonstrate potential for teaching and research.