Dr S Henson, Dr A Hickman
No more applications being accepted
Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)
About the Project
Project Rationale:
Human-induced climate change is expected to affect ocean biogeochemistry through increasing temperature, ocean acidification and deoxygenation. However, the implications of these changes for marine ecosystems are not well understood. We need to know when climate change effects will become apparent in the marine environment and how combinations of conditions (such as deoxygenation and ocean acidification) will arise. To do this, we need to quantify the expected climate change related signals in the ocean from predicted changes to the Earth system between the current day and the future. In addition, we need to improve our understanding of what is required (in terms of observational coverage, frequency, length of record etc.) to detect climate change signals in ocean biogeochemistry, which will allow optimal sampling strategies to be devised. Global climate models allow the natural variability and climate change trends in marine biogeochemistry to be explored, both in the recent past and into the future under different anthropogenic emissions scenarios. As part of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) process, output from multiple different models run under several future scenarios is available which allows assessment of the future state of ocean biogeochemistry.
Methodology:
In this project, the student will use existing and forthcoming model output from the IPCC archives. Analyses will be carried out to diagnose climate change trends and the emergence of novel combinations of conditions in temperature, pH and oxygen will be carried out to explore anomalous periods occurring in the recent past (1950’s to today). These will be compared to existing datasets, principally from the Continuous Plankton Recorder, to assess the effect of novel conditions on planktonic community structure. Analysis of future projections will permit insight into the potential impact of climate change trends on marine ecosystems. Different future climate scenarios will be compared to determine the influence that mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions may have on reducing the effects of climate change on ocean biology and biogeochemistry. The information gained from these analyses will be used to explore the requirements for an ocean observing network that will allow the changes in biogeochemistry to be most rapidly detected. The initial study region will be the North Atlantic, as this region is covered by multiple long-term biological records, but the study could be expanded to the global scale in later stages.
Training:
The INSPIRE DTP programme provides comprehensive personal and professional development training alongside extensive opportunities for students to expand their multi-disciplinary outlook through interactions with a wide network of academic, research and industrial/policy partners. The student will be registered at the University of Southampton and hosted at National Oceanography Centre, Southampton. Specific training will be provided on accessing and working with global climate model output and statistical analyses of time series data. Basic knowledge of Matlab or other programming language is a pre-requirement for this project.
The student will be part of the Ocean Biogeochemistry and Ecosystems group at NOC, which is renowned globally as one of the leading centres of excellence in biological research with plankton ecologists, numerical modellers, remote sensing specialists, theoreticians and geochemists working together to address the most significant problems in biological oceanography. The student can attend appropriate university Masters lecture courses to gain relevant background knowledge if needed. Presentation of results at national and international conferences will be encouraged. The student will also have the opportunity to participate in a research cruise.
Funding Notes
You can apply for fully-funded studentships (stipend and fees) from INSPIRE if you:
Are a UK or EU national.
Have no restrictions on how long you can stay in the UK.
Have been 'ordinarily resident' in the UK for 3 years prior to the start of the project.
Please click http://inspire-dtp.ac.uk/how-apply for more information on eligibility and how to apply
References
References (3 or fewer)
Lickley, M., b.b. Cael and S. Solomon (2019), Time of steady climate change, Geophysical Research Letters, 46, 5445-5451, doi: https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GL081704
Henson, S., C. Beaulieu, T. Ilyina, J. John, M. Long, R. Seferian, J. Tjiputra and J. Sarmiento (2017), Rapid emergence of climate change in environmental drivers of marine ecosystems, Nature Communications, 8:14682, doi: 10.1038/ncomms14682
Henson, S., C. Beaulieu and R. Lampitt (2016), Observing climate change trends in ocean biogeochemistry: when and where, Global Change Biology, 22(4), 1561-1571, doi: 10.1111/gcb.13152