Internship Project
Start-Ups: Scientific Research and Engineering

CIYANO – Development of Fossil-Free Additives for High-Performance Bio-Materials

Institution
Science & Startups
Subject Area
Polymer Chemistry: Bio-Based Materials
Availability
03 May – 23 July
 
Internship Modality:
On-site internship in Berlin
 
Project Supervisor(s)
Greta Zanellato
Koustubh Dube (Founder & CTO)
Academic Level
  • Advanced undergraduate students (from the second year)
  • Master’s students
  • Doctoral students

Language
English
Further Information
Project Type
Start-Up
Project Content
CIYANO Solutions GmbH is a Berlin deep-tech start-up that develops fossil-free polymer additives for bio-based materials. Bio-based plastics are a promising alternative to fossil plastics, but they often break, deform or fail in processing, which keeps them out of demanding applications. Our mission is to close that gap and make bio-based materials viable at industrial scale. Our core technology is a set of additives that enable different biopolymers to be blended into materials that are stronger and easier to process. This opens bio-based plastics to industries such as automotive and electronics. The technology is validated at lab scale, and we are now moving towards pilot-scale development together with industry partners. Our offices and laboratory are located at Freie Universität Berlin, where we are building our formulation, processing and testing capabilities.

Tasks for Interns
You will join a small, science-driven R&D team and work directly with our CTO (PhD in Polymer Science). You will see how a materials start-up takes a technology from the lab towards real products: from formulation, to testing, to first pilot batches.

Expected activities:
  • Preparing blends of bio-based polymers with and without our additives, as part of formulation screening
  • Producing test specimens and running mechanical and thermal tests (e.g., tensile testing, DSC, FTIR)
  • Recording experiments in a structured way and analyzing how composition and processing affect material properties
  • Assisting with the transfer of promising formulations from lab to larger batches
  • Summarising results for the team and presenting them at the end of the internship

Academic Level
  • Advanced undergraduate students (from the second year)
  • Master’s students
  • Doctoral students

Requirements
  • Student in chemistry, polymer science, materials science or a related field
  • Completed some practical university coursework in chemistry
  • Good working English, spoken and written
  • Careful and precise at the bench and in documenting experiments
  • Curious about how molecular structure shapes material properties
  • Able to work independently once trained, and to ask when something is unclear
  • Comfortable in a small team where things change quickly

Expected Preparation
Suggested reading before the start:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/app.45726
https://4spepublications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/pen.26626

Zurück zur Projektliste

For more information on the Humboldt Internship Program or the project, please contact the program coordinator.