PhD position in advanced data analysis of marine plastic litter (1.0 FTE)

The amount of plastic in our ocean is growing exponentially, with recent estimates of more than 5 million metric tonnes of plastic reaching the ocean each year. This plastic infiltrates the ocean food web and thus poses a major threat to marine life. However, understanding of the distribution, pathways and fate of plastic once in the ocean is very limited.
The project 'Tracking Of Plastics In Our Seas', funded by the European Research Council, will create a novel comprehensive modelling framework that simulates plastic movement through the ocean, and uses that framework to significantly improve the understanding of the plastic pollution in our oceans.

This PhD position will contribute to the compilation of a global 3-dimensional dataset of observations of plastic litter in the ocean, on the seabed, on coastlines and in marine organisms. Using advanced data analysis tools, the PhD will assemble interdisciplinary data from published observations and where necessary work with international collaborators to target under-sampled areas. The PhD will then use this new global dataset, in combination with numerical models of the transport of plastic, to create a global, three-dimensional estimate of distribution of plastic litter in our oceans.