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Marie Curie Training Site in Vienna, Austria

Atmospheric Fine Particles -Formation, Transport and Impact

Two Positions available for Graduate Students!

Core Project Description

The Marie Curie Training Site 'AFIP' in Vienna, Austria, is a multidisciplinary platform consisting of five university research groups active in different areas of atmospheric sciences. The main foci of the groups are environmental analytical chemistry and environmental meteorology. It is the aim of this interdisciplinary Site to provide a unique opportunity to learn and to use latest developments in analytical chemistry, air chemistry and aerosol science as well as environmental meteorology and atmospheric radiation within a close co-operation between highly specialised groups. Fellows may apply for participation in one of the following research activities pursued by the groups involved, or for research combining more than one of the topics:

Interested Ph.D. students should have a solid background in at least one of the areas covered by the Training Site (i.e. environmental analytical chemistry, aerosol science air chemistry, environmental meteorology) and send their application together with a scientific CV, list of publications, abstract of the master / diploma thesis and the name of one potential referee to the address give below. In addition, applicants should provide a short research plan. Austrian universities strive to strengthen the role of women in science. A special panel controls this goal and is available for help. Staffing and graduates from the involved research groups show that female fellows will find a supportive environment.

Aerosol science forms a broad sub-discipline of atmospheric sciences. Being closely linked to the fate and cycles of gaseous compounds, aerosols have emerged as an important, but still not well enough understood field of study. Besides of being important elements of biogeochemical cycles, aerosol particles alter the optical properties of the atmosphere, reflect solar radiation back to space, form nuclei for cloud droplet formation - and thus represent one of the most important elements of our climate system. Consequently successful research on these topics requires interdisciplinary co-operation, as practised in the proposed Marie Curie Training Site. The site consists of research groups active in different areas of the atmospheric sciences, with the main being environmental analytical chemistry and environmental meteorology. The aim of this MCTS is to provide a unique opportunity to learn and to use latest developments in analytical chemistry, air chemistry and aerosol science as well as environmental meteorology and atmospheric radiation within a close co-operation between highly specialised groups. The following topics shall give an outline on typical areas of research which will be offered to fellows:

At the MCTS 'AFIP' the fellows will have the possibility to gain expertise in the fields of environmental analytical chemistry, air chemistry, aerosol science and meteorology using the ample and diverse equipment, software tools, data sets and scientific know-how available at the research groups. Fellows will be guided in the sampling and analysis of aerosols as well as the interpretation of data sets of atmospheric trace constituents including reconstruction of source areas and analysis of transport patterns. They may learn from the cutting edge of research in receptor-oriented transport modelling and inverse modelling (source determination). However the most important benefit results from the multidisciplinary combination of several research groups of high international reputation active in the fields of environmental analytical chemistry and environmental meteorology.

Job descriptions (issued 10 March 2002):

1. Atmospheric Fine Particles (atmospheric or environmental sciences

Doctoral students in atmospheric or environmental sciences are invited to apply for a 3-12 month fellowship at the MCTS "Atmospheric Fine Particles" in Vienna.

Applicants must have a first degree (Diploma) in atmospheric science or a related field. They should be interested in working on source-receptor relationships of aerosol particles or related atmospheric trace substances. Programming skills in Fortran are important. Applicants can work on their own data sets or collaborate in our work. The trajectory model FLEXTRA, the Lagrangian particle model FLEXPART, the MM5 modelling system, and a number of evaluation programmes are available as well as access to global meteorological fields.

Applicants should submit the following documents (preferred way is submission of a pdf-file by electronic mail) to the contact address given below.

2. Atmospheric Fine Particles (environmental analytical chemistry or erosol and air chemistry)

Ph.D. students having a solid background in environmental analytical chemistry or aerosol and air chemistry are invited to apply for a 3-12 month fellowship at the MCTS "Atmospheric Fine Particles" in Vienna.

The present project is dealing with the determination of organic aerosols focussing on the organic carbon (OC) /elemental carbon (EC) separation as it can be achieved by various (thermal, thermo-optical and optical) methods. It can be expected, that macromolecular compounds ("bio-aerosols") are strongly influencing the discrepancies in the OC/EC split among methods. Furthermore the gaseous and "semi-volatile" organics hamper the unambiguous determination of OC in a filter sample. New continuous sampling methods for particulate total carbon (TC) or OC are expected to improve the sampling (and analysis) of organic aerosols.

Applicants should be interested in the above mentioned topics and should submit the following documents by email to the contact address given below.

AFIP (see Core Project Details) is a joint undertaking of the Institute of Meteorology and Physics at the University of Agricultural Sciences Vienna and the I nstitute of Analytical Chemistry of the Vienna University of Technology. Interdisciplinary work of the fellows is encouraged. Working languages are English and German.

The European Commission offers a salary of EUR 1200 p.m. + EUR 100 travel allowance paid directly through the MCTS.

       
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