Land Cover CCI Climate Research Post‐Doc Position

In the framework of the Land Cover (LC) project of the European Space Agency (ESA) Climate Change Initiative (CCI), we are looking for a Post-Doc researcher to address the challenges of improving the LC description in land surface models.

The project has completed two phases in which LC products have been successfully developed in collaboration with the climate modelling community. These products included a global time series of LC from 1992 to 2015, LC uncertainty estimates, and LC condition products. They are all available to view and download at https://maps.elie.ucl.ac.be/CCI/viewer/. Having recently started the third phase, the Medium Resolution (MR) LC CCI aims to build on this success by refining existing products and establishing the value of these products through peer‐reviewed publications. Consequently, this post‐doc represents an excellent opportunity to build on existing work and publish research with guidance from experts in the land surface and remote sensing communities. 


Job Purpose

The position is to be the focal point for climate‐related research on the LC CCI project. The jobholder will work at LSCE (Paris) and the Met Office (Reading or Exeter, UK) to conduct research, and publish results that make the best use of the LC CCI products. The selected candidate will be funded by UCLouvain-Geomatics (Belgium), the CCI LC project leader. Applications will be reviewed until the position is filled.


Job Responsibilities

The post‐doc will work with both the JULES and ORCHIDEE land surface models and will be required to work with satellite data, derived products and land surface models. 

The main research goals are:

- refining the existing Cross‐Walking Table (CWT) in collaboration with UCLouvain to convert LC classes to Plant Functional Type (PFT) fractions,

- improving urban LC information for the JULES land surface model

- merging the LC CCI dataset with other historical reconstructions to create a continuous record of LC

For further details on the job responsibilities and selection criteria, please click here.

Applicants will be asked to send their curriculum vitae (CV) and a motivation letter as soon as possible and not later than the 15 September 2019 to celine.lamarche@uclouvain.be with object “Application for the CCI MRLC Climate Research Post‐Doc”.

Sincerely,

The CCI LC team