PDRA: Ice Core Gas Analysis

Purpose:  

This PDRA will make significant contributions to our understanding past changes in atmospheric greenhouse gases as part of two major, international ice coring projects. First, the PDRA will contribute to analysis of new greenhouse gas records from the Beyond EPICA Oldest Ice Core (BE-OIC) project, a collaborative European effort to obtain a continuous ice core record of climate and carbon cycle changes across the mid-Pleistocene. This work will involve optimizing recent methodological advances developed jointly between British Antarctic Survey and the University of Cambridge in continuous flow analysis (CFA) of ice core greenhouse gases. The PDRA will be part of a team of ice core gas specialists that will analyze the oldest ice of the BE-OIC core in a CFA campaign to take place outside the UK. Secondly, the PDRA will join the FETCH₄ team to retrieve and analyze a high-resolution core from Greenland to reconstruct changes in the methane (CH₄) budget over the past few hundred years. FETCH₄ is a major multi-national research project funded by Schmidt Futures. This work will involve developing a gas chronology of the new ice core and studying past changes in CH₄ using simple box models. This work may involve field work to retrieve a new ice core from southeast Greenland.

Please feel free to contact Thomas Bauska (thausk@bas.ac.uk) for more information about this exciting opportunity.

Duties:

• Analysing the oldest ice samples from the Beyond EPICA project in conjunction with project partners to produce new records of atmospheric gases prior to 700,000 years ago that span the Mid-Pleistocene Transition.
• Process BE-OIC ice samples at the Alfred Wegener Institute in preparation for geochemical measurements
• Test and maintain a suite of Optical feedback – Cavity Enhances Absorption Spectrometer (OF-CEAS) instruments capable of analysing atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄), nitrous oxide (N₂O) and carbon monoxide (CO).
• Refine existing method for gas extraction to optimize signal resolution and recovery in preparation for gas CFA campaigns for both the Beyond EPICA and FETCH₄ projects.
• Potentially participate in one ice core drilling field season in southeast Greenland.
• Utilise the Cambridge Model of Emissions, Reactions and Atmospheric transport in a BOX (Camera-Box) model to study past variations in CH₄ and CO.  

Skills Specification

Qualifications

Essential:

• PhD in Earth Science, Physics, Chemistry, other-related Natural Science field

Desirable:

• Postdoctoral experience in ice cores/palaeoclimatology/geochemistry

Skills & Experience

Essential:

• Experience working in a (geo-) chemistry analytical laboratory
• Experience working independently on a research project
• Comfortable with math, physics and chemistry that are relevant to ice core research
• Data processing skills using programming languages
• Willingness to supervise undergraduate students
• Able to communicate effectively within a team
• Track record of publishing in international scientific journals
• Capability to prioritize work tasks and manage day-to-day time effectively
• Work effectively as part of a team, for example to arrange and undertake analytical work as efficiently as possible

Desirable:

• Skills in ice core laboratory analysis techniques, for example continuous flow analysis, vacuum systems and and/or optical spectrometry
• Experience with ice core CFA and/or gas analysis
• Demonstrate ability to lead a research topic or sub-topic
• Experience with coding numerical models
• Prior experience processing ice core CFA data
• Knowledge of automation software such as LabView
• Evidence of successful mentoring of students
• Track record of publishing analytical methods in scientific journals
• Demonstrate independent thinking and the ability to make quick decisions in time-critical situations that occur during CFA analysis
• Experience working in a large, international team

Other factors

Essential:

• Willingness to work safely in a laboratory cold room (<-20˚C)
• Willingness to work abroad (away from Cambridge) for extended periods.

The role holder will be required to have the appropriate level of security screening/vetting required for the role.  UKRI reserves the right to run or re-run security clearance as required during the course of employment.

Who are we?

British Antarctic Survey (BAS) delivers and enables world-leading interdisciplinary research in the Polar Regions. Its skilled science and support staff based in Cambridge, Antarctica and the Arctic, work together to deliver research that uses the Polar Regions to advance our understanding of Earth as a sustainable planet. Through its extensive logistic capability and know how BAS facilitates access for the British and international science community to the UK polar research operation. Numerous national and international collaborations, combined with an excellent infrastructure help sustain a world leading position for the UK in Antarctic affairs. British Antarctic Survey is a component of the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). NERC is part of UK Research and Innovation www.ukri.org.

We employ experts from many different professions to carry out our Science as well as to keep the lights on, feed the research and support teams and keep everyone safe!  We aim to attract the best people for our jobs.  If you are looking for an opportunity to work with amazing people in amazing places, then British Antarctic Survey could be for you.

Our vision

At BAS, our vision is to be a world-leading centre for polar science and operations. Making our vision a reality depends on the excellence and diversity of our staff. We are committed to creating a workplace where all our staff can flourish and succeed.  BAS is a Disability Confident employer, we are proud to hold a silver Athena Swan award and we are a member of enei, the Employers Network for Equality & Inclusion.

Working at BAS

Choosing to come to work at BAS means that you will have access to a whole host of benefits from a defined benefit pension scheme, excellent holiday entitlement, access to employee shopping/travel discounts and salary sacrifice cycle to work scheme.  You can find out more about our benefits here.  

We appreciate the importance of achieving work-life balance and support this with several family and carer-friendly policies. Plus, a flexible working policy for those who may wish to amend their working pattern or arrangement.  We also operate a hybrid working policy to support the balance of working time between the office and home.