Secondment: Rodrigo Ramirez visits University of Fribourg

As part of the secondments initiative of SuperCol, Rodrigo Rivas Barbosa (ESR 15) visited the University of Fribourg to collaborate with Xhorxhina Shaulli (ESR 10) at the research group of Prof. Frank Scheffold.

In order to achieve multidisciplinary and intersectoral training of the ESR’s in the SuperCol network, short internships between the partner organizations and industrial beneficiaries take place for each of the ESRs. During his stay in Fribourg, Rodrigo got to meet Scheffold’s very international group and learned about the great variety of subjects that are developed in Scheffold’s group. “As someone who does simulations, it was eye-opening to get to know the labs where Xhorxhina synthesizes and studies the microgels that I model. I obtained a deeper understanding of the processes by actually seeing how things are done.”

The two of them proceeded to plan and start writing a joint paper where experiments and simulations come together to understand thermosensitive microgels on different surfaces. But it was not only work, says Rodrigo: “During the weekends, guided by my very kind host Xhorxhina, we enjoyed hiking in the beautiful lakes and mountains surrounding Fribourg.”