Offer Description
European riverine and coastal floodplains are highly managed systems, where different human actions can both increase or decrease flood risk. Current European projections of future flood risk under climate change do not consider these types of effects and other dynamic interactions in floodplains. The aim of this project is to develop a European Socio-Hydrological Model (EuroSoHo) to quantify past and future flood risk dynamics across the continent. This probabilistic, system dynamics model will be calibrated on historical (1950–2025) data on flood occurrence, their impacts, floodplain exposure changes, and large-scale flood prevention schemes across more than 1400 regions in 42 European countries. The model will incorporate multiple socio-hydrological parameters (e.g. awareness, preparedness, reactiveness or risk aversion), quantifying the historical baseline of the society’s reaction to floods. EuroSoHo will then be able to project the future evolution (2026–2100) of the human-water system in Europe under the expected changes of both hydroclimatic and socioeconomic forcing. https://eurosoho.eu/
FUTURA coordinates European modelling and infrastructure efforts to jointly develop and deploy a sustainable, aligned system for delivering future emissions scenarios, and climate and impact projections to provide responsive support to international assessments and European and international climate policy. FUTURA explores how to design a new cyclical scenario generation protocol built from process-resolving models complemented by emulator and AI-based approaches, how to best align with assessment and policy timeframes, and how to leverage the model and data multiverse to advance understanding while supporting researchers, practitioners, and policymakers. It evaluates the plausibility, risks, impacts, and potential reversibility of future climate pathways, including temperature overshoot. This system is harnessed to assess climate extremes, feedbacks and tipping elements; carbon budgets; socio-economic and environmental impacts from a changing climate and changing societal drivers, and the risks, realisability, and implications of different global warming pathways, including temperature overshoot. The project explores the climate data multiverse and demonstrates its value in delivering actionable science by developing guidance and methods such as storylines to assess and communicate plausible environmental and socio-economic futures, bringing global scale climate change information to the scales needed for policy making. https://www.cmcc.it/projects/futura-future-of-climate-change-scenarios-of-the-earth-system-impacts-and-socio-economic-outcomes-for-assessment-and-and-society
Where to apply
E-mail: olga.terefenko@usz.edu.pl
Skills/Qualifications
- PhD degree in social sciences, geosciences, or in interdisciplinary research related to exposure to natural hazards.
- Good knowledge in the field of demography or economy.
- Strong background in geospatial analysis and statistics.
- Proficiency in spoken and written English.
- Proven record of publishing first-author scientific papers in journals from the JCR list.
- Good programming skills (e.g. Python, R or MATLAB) and experience in handling large datasets.
- High motivation to work and continuously develop scientific and personal skills.
- Good communication and problem-solving skills.
- Experience in teamwork, especially in an international setting.
- Ability to participate in work-related travel domestically and abroad.
Specific Requirements
- Producing population and economic exposure datasets at various spatial and temporal resolutions, covering spatial scales from local to global.
- Producing specialized extensions of the exposure datasets for specific applications, e.g. land use or water demand data, depending on project requirements.
- Implementing workflows needed to produce the datasets mentioned above with an open-source programming language, including spatial data processing, quality checks and visualizations.
- Supporting the principal investigator in supervising PhD students.
- Collaborating with other project members as well as external participants in developing the methodology of the analysis, including participation in short-term research missions abroad.
- Dissemination of the results of scientific research related to the implementation of the project through active participation in scientific conferences on an international and national scale, and publishing in scientific journals from the JCR list.
- Contributing to project reporting.
Additional Information
Benefits
· Work in dynamic and expanding scientific group with excellent research environment and international cooperation promoting publications in high impact journals.
· Fixed-term contract for 36 months with base salary of 11000-12000 PLN gross per month with full benefits of an academic employee including 36 annual leave days and supplementary payments in accordance to applicable laws.
· Financial support for short scientific missions and conference attendance.
· Support in preparing own grant applications and engaging in scientific and personal development.
Eligibility criteria
- CV with the information about participation in research projects, list of publications and/or conferences plus technical skills.
- Cover letter describing your academic interests and understanding of the project’s topic.
- Copy of PhD degree diploma or a confirmation from the university that the PhD thesis has been submitted.
- Consent to the processing of personal data. PDF format with a scanned original signature confirming of reading the information.
Selection process
The Recruitment Committee will consider the following criteria:
1. Competencies in specific tasks within the research project.
2. Previous scientific achievements.
3. Candidates’ participation in research projects/teams.
The best candidates may be invited to an online interview.
We reserve the right to contact and respond only to selected candidates.
The position will be offered to the candidate with the highest rating from the Recruitment Committee.
Recruitment results will be published within 30 days of the competition closing date.
If the best candidate does not sign the contract due to withdrawal, we reserve the right to select the next candidate from the ranking list.
The remaining candidates who were not selected in the competition will be notified within 7 days of the competition closing date.
Additional comments
Application forms are available for download at: http://dso.usz.edu.pl/druki/.
In the subject please write: “EuroSoHo PhD student “Candidates who receive a negative answer about the result of recruitment are entitled to lodge an appeal within 7 days. The appeal should be addressed to e-mail address: olga.terefenko@usz.edu.pl
Website for additional job details: https://bip.usz.edu.pl/oferta-pracy/26268/ogloszenie-o-konkursie-na-zatrudnieni…
