Modeling & Optimization Engineer

Who we are:
DUDE CHEM is a Green Chemistry startup with its origins in the German Cluster of excellence in Catalysis at the University of Technology Berlin. The industry currently consumes >13% of all fossil resources, most of them during the manufacturing.
Key Opinion Leaders of the industry have joined forces in order to change this: Based on the 12 Principles of Green Chemistry we aim to build a green chemical-pharmaceutical industry.
In order to achieve this goal, we have built a strong IP portfolio and validated the tech onto the market in order to reduce or reuse expensive resources in the production of chemicals and pharmaceuticals.
We believe that digitalization can be an integral tool for the implementation of greener, more sustainable production processes.
This is why we combine both scientific disciplines digitalization and sustainability in all of our projects. Over the last years, our team has proven that our approaches work and created hard competitive advantages in the core of the value chain of their.

Why we need you:
Many customers are approaching us in order to get our support and help them to outsource in a more sustainable and controlled way. Thus we need your help to bring our greener processes into manufacturing as part of our Development & Engineering Team.
In this role you will support our development efforts with your modeling and optimization expertise, especially in the area of reactions engineering. You will be responsible for developing and implementing complex mechanistic models for our greener processes and use these models to up-scale the process and run them in the optimal way.
If you want to bring innovative green chemical manufacturing processes from the lab scale into the plant scale and have a real positive impact on the world, you are the perfect match for us!

Tasks

Tasks you will be working on:
As a Modeling & Optimization Engineer, we expect you to accompany our manufacturing processes all the way from early development to their implementation in the manufacturing plant. Right from the start, we expect you to scale-up the reaction of one of our green processes by developing a mechanistic model. Afterward, it s all about finding the optimal operating conditions using the developed models and transferring the processes into manufacturing.

• Develop complex mechanistic models for the reaction and downstream processing operations of our greener processes.
• Predict physical and chemical properties (vapor pressure, VLE, LLE) and model the downstream processing operations such as extraction, distillation, crystallization, filtration and drying.
• Perform parameter estimation based on experimental data and validate the developed models.
• Use the developed models for the scale-up of the processes from lab scale to plant scale.
• Choose suitable modeling tools and build up our modeling framework.
• Define optimization problems, implement them and use the developed models to find the optimal operating conditions for the plant scale.
• Assess available optimization approaches and make decisions on optimization tools used.

Requirements

• Skills and attitudes that might be helpful:
  Degree (M.Sc., Dipl.-Ing or PhD) in chemical engineering, process engineering, technical chemistry or a related discipline.
• 2+ years experience in the pharmaceutical industry or equivalent experience is a plus.
• Experience in scaling up of reactions and downstream processing operations from the lab to the plant scale using state-of-the-art modeling approaches.
• Knowledge in reaction engineering, reaction kinetics, multi-phase reaction systems, thermodynamics, and downstream processing operations such as extraction, distillation, crystallization, filtration, and drying.
• Experience in computational solving complex Differential-Algebraic-Equation (DAE) Systems and model parameter estimation.
• Experience in Python or a similar programming language like MATLAB.
• Experience using modeling and simulation tools such as AspenPlus, gProms, DynoChem, IDAES.
• Experience with optimization tools such as Pyomo, GAMS or AMPL.
• Experience with version control (Git) and automated testing is a plus.
• Good organizational and time-management skills.
• Highly self-driven, professional personality with an aspiration to excel in the role.
• Excellent written and oral communication, as well as presentation skills. Being fluent in English is a must, in German a plus.

Benefits

What we offer:
We regard your skills as well as your conscience as our highest assets. We provide every team member with a veto right on projects, e.g., if you don t want to work for a specific customer due to moral reasons. There were several occasions that also our CEO made use of this right.
Additionally, we offer an INTERESTING work: you will learn from quantum scientists as well as from green chemists - and they are looking forward to learn from you!
We are rigorously state-of-the-art driven and we promise that we will always listen to your ideas. Our dynamic hierarchies enable us to flexibly adapt our organizational structure to the level of expertise required in a project. Sometimes you will learn and sometimes you will have the lead in a project.
Open communication and direct feedback are values that we live every day. The conviction to do something that creates a positive impact in the world drives us forward.
We offer very flexible working hours (results orientation) and the integration into an extremely motivated interdisciplinary team. Moreover, you will have all the possibilities to further develop yourself and to help us to build an industry anew.
DuDeChem strives to be a diverse and inclusive workplace where we can all be ourselves. We encourage job applications from people of all genders, backgrounds, and communities.
We are a young, enthusiastic team that likes each other very much and we d be very pleased if you d be interested in working with us!
Unfortunately, we neither are able to pay you Google-like salaries, nor are we able to pay them to ourselves. However, we will do our best to consider your individual needs and the specific circumstances you are in. Additionally, we have established a stock option pool for our employees, you will get 28 days holidays per year on a 100% position and we support your annual ticket for the Berlin public transport.
Being a startup, we of course provide you with organic fruits, snacks and non-alcoholic drinks in our office because your health is important to us Coaching and job relevant training is supported as well. We take the health of our employees very seriously and apply strictly 2G+ rules in our offices and labs. We encourage remote work but we aim for regular personal meetings as well.
Anything else you need? Just let us know! :-)
Let s transform the industry together to the better!

Why Berlin:
Berlin, the capital of Germany, with its vibrant startup scene and high quality of life is right now developing towards a global Green Chemistry hotspot. DuDeChem works very closely with the Green Chemistry Incubator Chemical Invention Factory and the German Scientific Cluster of Excellence in Chemistry (UniSysCat).

How you can apply:
Send your CV and what you consider relevant for us to our team.

We are very much looking forward to hearing from you!