Postdoctoral researcher on Land-Use

The European Geosciences Union e.V. is seeking a Postdoctoral Researcher on Land-Use in Spain. The role involves analyzing historical vegetation and land-use changes and creating high-resolution datasets for climate model applications. Responsibilities include developing time-varying datasets, collaborating on projects like TerraDT and CONCERTO, and contributing to scientific publications. A PhD in spatial modeling is required. This position is not remote.
Postdoctoral Researcher on Land-Use/Land-Cover Change and Remote Sensing of Vegetation

We are looking for an enthusiastic and talented researcher to analyze historical variability in vegetation and land use change, and produce novel high-resolution datasets of land-use/land-cover and vegetation characteristics in the historical period and future projections.

The successful candidate will be responsible for the creation and assessment of time-varying land surface boundary conditions to be used in several climate model applications, with the aim of providing more accurate surface boundary conditions for climate projections and seasonal-to-decadal forecasting.
About the Position

This position will primarily contribute to the Horizon Europe projects TerraDT and CONCERTO. The TerraDT project aims to include novel processes into the cutting-edge Digital Twins of the Earth System, such as time-varying land cover and LAI (Leaf Area Index) and interactive aerosols with interactive dust emissions. The CONCERTO project aims to advance the understanding and modeling of carbon cycle processes within Earth System Models such as EC-Earth4.

The candidate will be responsible for the development and assessment of time-varying, high resolution (1 km) Land Use (LU) and Land Cover (LC) and Leaf Area Index (LAI) datasets. The analysis will leverage satellite-based data products and historical land-use data to reconstruct and extend land dynamics back to 1850 using land-use change modelling, spatial analysis and/or machine learning methodologies, as well as in the future using the newly developed Land-Use change scenarios for CMIP7. An independent verification of the Land Use and Land Cover (LULC) products will be done using regional products based on high-resolution satellite imagery before 1993.

The position will be hosted in the Climate Variability and Change (CVC) Group within BSC's Earth Science Department. The CVC Group undertakes fundamental research to understand climate variability and change, including for climate extremes, investigate global biogeochemical dynamics, and the effectiveness and impacts of carbon removal technologies to mitigate climate change, develop new Earth System modeling capabilities, and improve our ability to forecast the climate variations from one month to multiple decades into the future, both at global and regional scales.

The candidate will also have the opportunity to participate in other research activities within the CVC group. In particular, contributions are anticipated to the evaluation of the climate modelling experiments conducted by the CVC group using the EC-Earth Earth System Model which simulates the Global Carbon Cycle at timescales ranging from multi-annual to centennial.
Key Duties
• Create and assess the time-varying Land Use, Land Cover and LAI datasets
• Collaborate with colleagues and external partners in the integration of these datasets in the Digital Twin models in the TerraDT project and Earth System Models in the CONCERTO project
• Lead the preparation of scientific publications, and present the research at scientific workshops and conferences
• Analyze the contributions of vegetation and land-use change to the global carbon cycle in the climate projections and near-time climate predictions
Requirements

Education: PhD in spatial modelling, land-use change, geography, or a related discipline

Essential Knowledge and Professional Experience:
• Demonstrated experience in the analysis of geo-spatial and remote sensing data and/or Land-use change models
• Proven ability to prepare and submit manuscripts to peer-reviewed scientific journals
• Programming skills: scripting (e.g. bash, Python, R), open-source spatial data analysis and visualization software (e.g. GeoPandas, r-spatial, QGis)

Additional Knowledge and Professional Experience:
• Interest and capacity in participating in the writing of research and computing proposals
• Experience with vegetation model and/or climate model data
• Knowledge of version control systems (git, svn, …)

Competences:
• Fluency in spoken and written English
• Highly collaborative spirit and ability to work independently as part of a large, strongly-coordinated team