PhD Marine PalynologyPaleoceanography and Paleoclimatology MMCO (1.0 FTE)

The Department of Earth Sciences at Utrecht University is currently seeking a motivated PhD candidate to work on the research project.

Early-Middle Miocene Climate Sensitivity and Polar Amplification: a high-resolution multi-proxy approach

Forecasting the magnitude of future global and regional warming is among the grand scientific challenges. Model estimates of long-term warming resulting from a doubling of the CO2 concentration relative to the pre-industrial era range between 1.5 and 4.5 °C. Moreover, it remains uncertain to what extent this warming is amplified towards polar regions.

Within a Consolidator Project funded by the European Research Council termed SPANC, these factors, Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity and polar amplification, will be investigated through accurate reconstructions of past climate change. To this end, the hired PhD candidate will generate reconstructions of pCO2, temperature and ecology across portions of the Early to Middle Miocene (20-15 million years ago). Such proxy records will be based on sedimentary organic matter (biomarkers, dinoflagellate cyst assemblages and ?13C) and foraminifer calcite (isotope and elemental ratios).

The project leader and daily supervisor will be Prof. dr. Appy Sluijs, and close collaboration in this project will be with Dr. Francesca Sangiorgi and Dr. Francien Peterse. The SPANC project further encompasses a postdoc validating and calibrating a novel proxy for CO2 based on dinoflagellate culturing experiments. In addition, there is currently a vacancy for a PhD student who will focus on the Early Eocene (follow this link). Analytical support is available through two technicians. Further collaborations will be with colleagues at Utrecht University and abroad, notably (organic) geochemists, micropaleontologists and climate modelers.

Up to 10% of the candidate's time will be dedicated to assisting in the BSc and MSc teaching programmes of the Earth Sciences department. A personalized training programme will be set up, mutually agreed on recruitment, which will reflect the candidate's training needs and career objectives.