Jobs

The Georges Lemaître centre for Earth and Climate Research (https://uclouvain.be/fr/node/40969), part of the Earth and Life Institute at the Université catholique de Louvain is offering an 18 months postdoc position. The candidate will work in the framework of the European Space Agency Funded project Worldsoils (https://www.world-soils.com/). WORLDSOILS aims to develop a pre-operational Soil Monitoring System to provide yearly estimations of Soil Organic Carbon (SOC) at global scale, exploiting space-based EO data leveraging large soil data archives and modelling techniques to improve the spatial resolution and accuracy of SOC maps. The main research questions are on the potential of the Sentinel products for SOC monitoring and mapping. We strive to increase the precision and reduce the uncertainty in order to use the SOC monitoring for a sustainable management of the soil resources.

Your responsibilities are:

· Research on SOC prediction using spectral models

· Develop machine learning techniques for mapping SOC in croplands

· Validation of SOC maps at the regional scale as specified in the World Soils project

· Publication of results in international peer reviewed journals

We expect:

· Completed PhD in Geography, Soil Science, Remote sensing, Agriculture, Environmental Sciences or other closely related discipline

· A research interest in the application of machine learning

· Expertise in multivariate statistics for large data sets

· Experience in remote sensing of soil properties

· Experience in programming (R and/or Python)

The appointment will start as soon as possible and will be limited to July 2023 (an extension will be possible). The work place is Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium. Salary will be according to the University’s scales. For foreign postdocs a fellowship is foreseen that includes social security benefits. Please send your application including a motivation letter, a detailed curriculum vitae and the coordinates of two references before 30 November 2021 to Bas van Wesemael (bas.vanwesemael@uclouvain.be).

The climate of the Polar Regions has dramatically changed over the last decades. This may have resulted from external forcing, but also from natural interactions between the components of the climate system. Quantifying the specific contribution of each individual driver is critical to understand decadal variability and predict future changes.

Based on the complementary scientific expertise of the project partners, the PARAMOUR project  aims at revealing fundamental drivers of climate variability and assessing the predictability in high-latitudes by using coupled regional climate models in both hemispheres.

The partners of the project invite applications for the following position:

• Post-doctoral researcher
• Starting date before January 1, 2022
• Full time position for 24 months
• Net monthly salary: 2300-2500 € (depending on seniority - this includes social insurances). Transportation to and from workplace is covered.
• Location: Earth and Life Institute, Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium
• The candidates must not have spent more than 2 years in Belgium over the last 3 years and should not have obtained their PhD more than 6 years before the starting date of the grant.

The post-doctoral scientist will contribute to advance understanding of the processes driving the recent variability of the ice-ocean system and how they could lead to predictability at interannual to decadal timescale. He/she will perform and analyse simulations with the global ocean and sea ice model NEMO-LIM and with a new coupled atmosphere-ocean-sea ice-ice sheet model covering Antarctica and the Southern Ocean, in collaboration with the other scientists working on the project. Dedicated numerical experiments will be devised and run with those models, including for example (but not limited to): activation or not of explicit melting rates at the ocean-ice shelves boundaries and impact on the ocean / sea ice state; applying a constraint on the model winds (e.g., by nudging towards climatological values) to disentangle thermodynamic from dynamic processes on the sea ice variability; supressing the feedbacks between sea ice and ocean to quantify their role in recent trends.

Required qualifications:

• To have a PhD in climatology, Earth science or related field (physics, informatics) with previous experience in Earth science; 
• To have published in peer-reviewed international journals; 
• To have strong experience in programming and in managing large data sets;
• To have demonstrated verbal and written communication skills in English; 
• To have interest in working in a multidisciplinary team environment.

Applicants should send via e-mail to Hugues Goosse (hugues.goosse@uclouvain.be) (i) a statement of research experience, qualification and interest, (ii) a complete CV including a list of publications, and (iii) the name of two scientists who would agree to send a letter of recommendation Review of the applications will start September 15 and the call is open until the position is filled.