The Department of Civil, Environmental, Land, Building Engineering and Chemistry (DICATECh) of Politecnico di Bari invites public applications for a 3-years scholarship for the PhD programme in Risk, Environmental, Territorial and Building Development (DRSATE) to carry out a doctoral research on landslide risk mitigation.

The deadline for application is at 15:00 (Italian time) of 18 October 2021.

Further details in the attached file.

Droughts (water stress) and extreme heat events (rising temperature and vapor pressure deficit (VPD)) can drastically reduce carbon uptake via downregulating photosynthesis, and can trigger tipping points such as widespread vegetation mortality. Researches into the mechanisms governing when, where and how trees die have revealed that plant xylem hydraulic traits are the predominant significant predictors of cross-sites and species patterns in drought response of ecosystem functioning. Specifically, water stress-induced declines in xylem water potential, deteriorates the hydraulic conductance of xylem tissue and forms embolisms that impair water transport, cascading a series of failures of key dependent processes (e.g., gas exchange, photosynthesis, phloem transport), leading to tissue desiccation and ultimately to vegetation mortality. Furthermore, plant hydraulics  convolute with subsurface soil water/heat/carbon dynamics, which make the soil-water-plant-energy interaction an intricate topic.

Remote sensing of fluorescence and plant-hydraulics-based vegetation models are state-of-the-art approaches to monitor and predict drought responses of ecosystem functioning. In EcoExtreML project, you are expected to enhance/reinforce the coupling between the vegetation photosynthesis model (SCOPE) with the soil moisture/heat model (STEMMUS, considering dynamic root growth), synergized with Earth-Observation data, to understand how water-carbon dynamics of ecosystem vary with variable environmental and climate stress. You are expected to work with a multidisciplinary team, consisting experts from vadose zone hydrology, ecohydrology, remote sensing, big geodata analytics, machine learning, as well as eSciences.

More information to be found on this website: https://www.utwente.nl/en/organisation/careers/!/185/researcher-for-the-ecoextreml-project

The section of Geo-Engineering at Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands) is searching for a doctoral student to enhance the understanding and the modelling of the coupled hydro-mechanical behaviour of soft soils subjected to cycles of environmental and mechanical loads.

Soft highly organic soils are widespread in the foundation layers of the built environment all over the world. They contain organic matter, roots and fibres, which improve their mechanical response. However, these soils are extremely vulnerable to climate-related hazards. Increasing climatic stresses, such as heat waves, drought, and more frequent intense precipitation accelerate the degradation of organic soils, by increasing their drying and shrinkage rate above the water table and their decomposition rate under water, with gas generation and exsolution. Both these mechanisms, drying and gas exsolution, ultimately contribute to significant land subsidence and reduction in available resistance. Quantifying the geotechnical engineering consequences of seasonally varying loads, including drying-wetting, temperature cycles and degradation, on organic soils is extremely challenging due to the complexity of a proper description of multi-physics gas-liquid-solid interaction. The project aims at deepening the understanding and the modelling of these coupled processes, to mitigate the climate-related hazard in natural soils and to assist in the design of durable innovative green solutions.

The twofold aim of the PhD project is:

• To experimentally investigate the coupled hydro-mechanical behaviour of organic soils subjected to cycles of environmental (e.g. drying and wetting, temperature) and mechanical loads. Soft soils reinforced with natural and artificial organic fibres will be tested, to quantify the role played by fibres, gas and fabric on their mechanical behaviour.
• To enhance existing constitutive models in order to include the effects of environmental factors such as drying-wetting cycles, temperature cycles and degradation in the prediction of their geotechnical properties.

More information about the vacancy and the employment conditions can be found in this PDF FILE.

Are you interested in this vacancy? Please apply before 17 October 2021 via the TU Delft website (Job details (tudelft.nl)) and upload: a detailed CV, motivation letter (1 page maximum), contact details of 2 referees.

For further information please contact:
Dr. Stefano Muraro: S.Muraro@tudelft.nl
Prof. Dr. Cristina Jommi: C.Jommi@tudelft.nl

The Nottingham Centre for Geomechanics (NCG) is currently undertaking two large multi-disciplinary projects related to investigating the behaviour of coal-mining spoil materials with a focus on the geotechnical, sustainability, environmental, socio-economic and long-term management challenges. NCG brings together expertise from the worlds of civil, geotechnical, and mining engineering as well as mathematics and material sciences to solve all forms of soil and rock-related design and construction problems. The projects are funded by the European Commission Research Fund for Coal and Steel (RFCS) and include project partners from across Europe. We seek a highly motivated researcher to join our team to work on this challenging project.

We are looking to recruit a post-doctoral researcher who will support the work of these RFCS projects as well as support the wider work of the research group. We are looking for someone with a strong numerical and/or constitutive modelling background in geomechanics, preferably someone with experience using ABAQUS.

Candidates should be inquisitive, with a strong interest in applied research, and the personality and drive to interact effectively with industry and project partners. They will have a first degree in Civil Engineering or cognate subject and will have been awarded a PhD (or have submitted their thesis for examination), ideally in an area of Geotechnical Engineering. The successful candidate will have good presentation and report writing skills. A good publication record will be an advantage but its absence should not hinder applications from those who have recently submitted their theses.

For application details see https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/jobs/currentvacancies/ref/ENG373021

Further information about the work of the Nottingham Centre for Geomechanics is available on www.nottingham.ac.uk/ncg/

Dr Xuzhen He from UTS is seeking high-achieving PhD students in 2022. The research project is “Multiscale modelling of fluid–particle transport in porous media”, which is funded by the Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Researcher Award. Candidates with knowledge and research experience in computational fluid mechanics, discrete element method, and/or multiscale modelling are encouraged to apply.

Applications can be sent to Dr Xuzhen He (xuzhen.he@uts.edu.au). The positions are open until filled.

More information in this pdf file.

The Department of Civil, Geological and Mining Engineering of Polytechnique Montréal is seeking exceptional candidates for a tenure track faculty position at the assistant or associate professor level.

The successful candidate must hold a Bachelor’s degree and a Ph.D. in Civil engineering or a relevant discipline, with a specialization in geotechnical engineering.

Candidates are invited to submit an application that includes:

• their résumé;
• a description of their area of expertise;
• a statement of their teaching and training objectives;
• a description of their proposed research objectives and program;
• official records of their diplomas;
• full contact information of three (3) persons able to provide references;
• a few examples of work relevant to the position;
• three (3) recent scientific contributions;
• teaching evaluations if applicable.

Applications must be received no later than November 1^st, 2021 at 5:00 pm, and submitted to:

Professor Richard Simon, ing., Ph.D.
Acting Director
Department of Civil, Geological and Mining Engineering
Polytechnique Montréal
PO Box 6079, Succ. Centre-Ville
Montreal (Quebec) H3C 3A7
CANADA

E-mail: candidaturescgm@polymtl.ca

Examination of the applications will begin as soon as possible and will continue until the position is filled.

More information on this website.