PhD (f/m/d)
The role of animals for forest ecosystem carbon and nutrient cycling (75% part-time)

Organizational unit

Institut für Meteorologie und Klimaforschung Atmosphärische Umweltforschung (IMKIFU)

Job description

Do you have knowledge of land ecosystems, climate change and land use change? Do you have good quantitative and coding skills? Are you keen to apply these to address societal and ecological research challenges? If so, we can offer you to earn your PhD degree within a multidisciplinary, international research training group, with partners at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany, the University of Melbourne, Australia and the University of Hohenheim, Germany.

C4LaNd is a new research training group that brings together senior and doctoral researchers from the natural, social, economic and engineering sciences to address the challenges of sustainably using land for the benefit of both people and nature. You will receive a dual PhD degree from KIT and University of Melbourne, including a one-year research stay in Melbourne. Further information on C4LaNd, and the PhD positions advertised can be found at C4LaNd.earth.The PhD position is within the Global Land-Ecosystem Modelling Group (https://lemg.imkifu.kit.edu/) at KIT-Campus Alpin (IMKIFU) in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, partnered with the Quantitative and Applied Ecology Group at Melbourne, Australia (https://qaeco.com/landing/).

The overarching question of the doctoral research will be: how does the presence or absence of full trophic chains affect carbon and nutrient cycling in natural ecosystems, in the present day and under future climate change?

Lines of research include:

• Familiarize yourself with the ecosystem models LPJ-GUESS and Madingley
• Further develop key processes in Madingley (e.g. selective or height-depended feeding; introduction of detritivores, etc.)
• Explore literature and other data sources to support this parameterization as well as model evaluation
• Conduct simulations and evaluate output against observations
• Develop ideas for model applications, simulation set-up and analysis and publications
• Document code development and performance

Starting date

01.10.2026

Personal qualification

You have:

• M.Sc. degree in environmental science, ecology, meteorology, or related areas
• knowledge in coding languages, ideally C++
• proficiency in Python or R
• fluency in English, written and spoken
• delight in engaging within the environment of an international, multidisciplinary training programme
• willingness to undertake a one-year research placement at the University of Melbourne, Australia and comply with formalities at both locations
• readiness to engage within the LPJ-GUESS and Madingley communitiy
• willingness to travel between KIT-Campus Alpin (IMKIFU), Garmisch-Partenkirchen and KIT Karlsruhe for C4LaNd courses