Part-time Senior Research Associate Position in Creative Impact: Digital Technology and Living with Environmental Change (A3119)

An exciting opportunity exists for a research position focussing on creative impact, working on a cross-disciplinary programme of research investigating the role of digital technology in understanding, mitigating and adapting to environmental change. The programme is associated with a £2.5m EPSRC Senior Fellowship awarded to Prof. Gordon Blair under the recent Digital Technology/ Living with Environmental Change (DT/LWEC) call. This is a prestigious and high profile award targeting excellent science alongside high impact on society and policy makers.

The research programme focuses specifically on three highly complementary areas of digital technology, namely the Internet of Things (providing a source of rich environmental data), cloud computing (providing the elastic capacity to store and analyse this data) and data science (providing novel techniques to make sense of this complex data). Science is also a key conduit in understanding and interpreting the resultant complex data, with the technology also having the potential to be transformative to the science itself (e.g. towards a more open, integrative and collaborative science).

For this particular position we are seeking a post-doc working on applied research around impact and in particular seeking creative and digitally-inspired techniques to enhance our impact to a wide range of audiences. We have a strong track record of using creative design elements throughout our research and seek to build on this legacy and to foster new ways of reaching out to policy makers, the science body and the general public. This may draw on research in creative and digitally-inspired approaches to communication and/or the rich body of work around the role of arts and/or design in science. We are particularly interested in the role of digitally enhanced narrative in communicating complex environmental findings. We seek to make research contributions in these areas as well as to enhance impact and outreach of the work through these activities.

We seek applicants who are excited by working on environmental grand challenges and on the potential of working at the interface between disciplines in addressing these challenges. We address a different thematic challenge each year and in the forthcoming final year, we will focus on ecosystems and systems thinking approaches in complex environmental systems building on previous studies of flooding, biodiversity and soils. Knowledge of at least one of these areas is important for this position.

A PhD in a related area is required to be eligible for these positions, and this must include aspects of creative communication. You will have a track record of high-quality publications in areas of relevance to the project and the willingness to undertake ambitious and challenging research.  For more details, please see the detailed Job Description/Person Specification for this position.

You will join us on an indefinite contract however, the role remains contingent on external funding which, at this time is due to come to an end on 30 June 2021.

This is a part-time position at 2 days a week and we are flexible about precise working arrangements. 

Interested candidates are strongly encouraged to contact Prof. Gordon Blair in advance of making an application (g.blair@lancaster.ac.uk).

We welcome applications from people in all diversity groups.

Closing Date: 18 Nov 2020
Category: Research