PhD Position in Human Nutrition - Ingredient-specific drivers of gastric emptying and satiety

Are you looking for a PhD position and do you like to participate in an exciting interdisciplinary research project to discover how different ingredients affect food digestion and appetite? Are you a nutritionist or food technologist with interest in digestion, metabolism and the regulation of food intake? Then this PhD position may be of interest to you.

Satiety is experienced as the subjective feeling of fullness following food intake, which hinders further consumption of food. Calorie-matched foods have varying effects on the secretion of appetite-related gut hormones and differ widely in their postprandial satiety effects. Dietary fibers are associated with enhanced satiety and reduced later food intake, but currently the mechanisms of how of different dietary fibers contribute to satiety is poorly understood. The co-ingestion of fibers and bulking agents with specific structures and gelling properties can increase the release of appetite-related gut hormones such as GLP-1 and decrease subsequent food intake. However, in how far these effects are due to slower gastric emptying or other gastric processes, increased production of gut-hormones or both remains unknown.

In this industry-funded partnership project you will do multi-disciplinary work to assess the underlying mechanisms of how different ingredients impact on digestion and subsequent metabolic and appetite effects using established in vitro digestion models, gut imaging techniques, and in vivo assessment of metabolic and appetite effects in healthy volunteers. The acquired knowledge can be used to inform ingredient processing and new product development e.g. aimed at achieving a desirable satiety response.

Your duties and responsibilities include:

• you will conduct in-vitro experiments to measure the (gelling) behavior and breakdown of different ingredients;
• you will conduct human feeding trials with selected ingredients to establish their intra-gastric behavior, gut hormone, and appetite effects in-vivo;
• you will analyse data to establish links between in-vitro and in-vivo digestive behavior, metabolic and appetite responses of different ingredients;
• you will use the knowledge gained to better characterize and explain the metabolic and satiety effects of different ingredients;
• you will publish your research in high-quality academic journals, present it at academic conferences and for other audiences, and publish it as your PhD thesis.

Your team
Your WUR supervisors will be Dr. Paul Smeets and Prof. Dr. Ciarán Forde (Sensory Science and Eating Behaviour chair group). Dr. Davide Risso, external research scientist, will co-supervise.

You have:

• a successfully completed MSc degree in human nutrition, food technology, or a related discipline;
• interest and/or background in human digestion, metabolism, eating behaviour and appetite regulation, and food process engineering;
• independence, perseverance in problem solving;
• the ability to quickly acquire new skills and knowledge;
• excellent (academic) writing and oral communication skills in English.

You are someone who can work independently, but also a team player who enjoys working in a multidisciplinary team.

In our international working environment there is a substantial amount of communication in English. For this position your command of the English language is expected to be at C1 level. Sometimes it is necessary to submit an internationally recognised Certificate of Proficiency in the English Language. More information on this can be found here.

You will work here
You will work in the Sensory Science and Eating Behaviour chair group which is embedded in the Division of Human Nutrition and Health and part of the department of Agrotechnology and Food Sciences.

Wageningen University offers excellent terms of employment. A few highlights from our Collective Labour Agreement include:

• sabbatical leave, study leave, and partially paid parental leave;
• working hours that can be discussed and arranged so that they allow for the best possible work-life balance;
• there is a strong focus on vitality and you can make use of the sports facilities available on campus for a small fee;
• a fixed year-end bonus of 8.3%;
• excellent pension scheme.

In addition to these first-rate employee benefits, you will of course receive a good salary. Depending on your experience, we offer a competitive gross salary of between €3.059,-. and €3.881,-. for a full-time working week of 38 hours, in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreements for Dutch Universities (CAO-NU) (scale P). We offer a temporary contract for 18 months which will be extended with 30 months if you perform well.

Wageningen University & Research offers plenty of opportunities for growth and development and excellent training programmes.

You will work on the greenest and most innovative campus in the Netherlands, in an international and open working environment. For 20 consecutive years, we have been voted the "best university" in the Netherlands! A place to be proud of.

Coming from abroad
Wageningen University & Research is the university and research centre for life sciences. The themes we deal with are relevant to everyone around the world and therefore, Wageningen has a large international community and a lot to offer to international employees.

Because we expect you to work and live in the Netherlands our team of advisors on Dutch immigration procedures will help you with the visa application procedures for yourself and, if applicable, for your family.

If you come with a partner, we offer a Dual Career group program organized by our Welcome Center. This program helps your partner to get familiar with the Dutch culture, labour market and assists your partner to find a job.

Feeling welcome also has everything to do with being well informed. Wageningen University & Research's International Community page contains practical information about what we can do to support international employees coming to Wageningen. Furthermore, our Welcome Center can assist you with any additional advice and information about for example housing, opening a bank account or schooling. Finally, certain categories of international staff may be eligible for a tax exemption on a part of their salary during the first five years in the Netherlands.

The mission of Wageningen University & Research is ‘To explore the potential of nature to improve the quality of life’.

We pursue this mission through a synergistic approach between Wageningen University and Wageningen Research Foundation (applied research). Our research focuses on questions within the domains of food, living environment, and society. With approximately 30 locations, 7,700 staff members, 2,500 PhD candidates, and over 13,000 students, Wageningen University & Research is among the world’s leading knowledge institutions in its domain. The integral approach to challenges and the collaboration across various disciplines form the core of the unique Wageningen approach.

Read the 5 reasons why your future colleagues enjoy working at WUR.

We will recruit for the vacancy ourselves and do not appreciate unasked for services from recruitment agencies. However, sharing in your network is appreciated.