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  QUARTILES DLA: Historic Erosion, Erosion Susceptibility and Heritage at Risk: Effective Heritage Management Strategies in the Face of Climate Change at Scotland’s Coastal Promontory Forts


   School of Geosciences

  , , ,  Wednesday, February 19, 2025  Funded PhD Project (Students Worldwide)

About the Project

This fully funded PhD project is part of the QUARTILES Doctoral Landscape Award, a BBSRC and NERC-funded research and training programme designed to equip PhD students with the skills, expertise, outlook, and real-world experience needed to become the next generation of scientific leaders capable of addressing pressing environmental grand challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and sustainability.

Within heritage science undoubtedly THE environmental grand challenge to the management of cultural heritage assets is climate change which is having a huge impact on the survival of archaeological sites particularly across the northern world as rising sea levels and coastal erosion leads to very significant loss of critical data. With these heightening challenges priorities must be made as to what to foreground in our environmental management strategies, yet climate research has only had minor impact on traditional heritage studies. Undoubtedly one of the most threatened categories of sites are coastal promontories and sea stacks which were utilised as settlements, fortifications and sites to facilitate maritime connectivity from the Neolithic to the medieval period. These sites were located on naturally defensive coastal promontories and sea stacks that make them hugely vulnerable to erosion with some notable losses in recent years. Despite the threat these coastal sites have never been fully mapped or quantified in northern Britain and rarely have their past and future survival been the subject of integrated geoscience research. More frequent extreme weather events and sea level rise (predicted to be almost a metre above present levels by 2100 (IPCC 2022) under the most extreme scenarios) will have the greatest impact on coastal erosion rates in the coming decades as the intertidal zone extends further inland impacting on a greater number of sites and posing major threat to coastal cultural heritage sites. In that context, coastal promontories are irreplaceable resources that provide unique insights into past lives due often to their much better preservation of structural remains and settlement (where erosion has not been too great) than inland areas (e.g. See Noble et al. 2018) yet they are also highly sensitive, vulnerable and exposed places increasingly at risk of being lost to science.

Heritage management bodies and scientists are only just beginning to develop the tools and quantitative methods to monitor the risks posed to such sites through techniques such as coastal zone assessment and aerial and ground surveys, but these are rarely combined and have never been applied to a complete body of data for a singular dataset. Rarely considered too are the integrated geoscience approaches that can consider elements such as the rates of historic loss utilising GIS mapping tools that can quantify erosion and shoreline displacement. In this PhD the geological substrate (lithologies of cliffs and, bedding and jointing density and orientation, etc) will be mapped alongside erosion modelling using Historic Erosion plugins for SRI ArcGIS 10.5.1. and Digital Shoreline Analysis System (DSAS) techniques (Himmelstoss et al. 2018). In addition LiDAR and UAV survey will map the sites over repeated visits to monitor rates of loss. Geological assessment and repeated MBES bathymetric surveys around promontories to understand the costal change and seabed morphological evolution and processes will also be undertaken. Ground-testing of sites using traditional archaeological approaches such as excavation and geophysical survey will also assess levels of survival of these sites vis-à-vis past climate change and erosion events. The PhD will fully catalogue for the first time a heritage resource of over 200 sites, map past coastal change at these, produce condition assessments including their geologic susceptibility to erosion and will develop future predictive models for the sites most under threat from future climate change. At a broad level the PhD will also provide quantification of the resource and overall models for future management and mitigation, but in a series of case studies will also quantify loss and threat at the local level providing a unique resource for understanding the threats posed to heritage resources due to climate change.

The project will include GIS training including the Historic Erosion Modelling and Digital Shoreline Analysis. Supervision in geology will lead training on analysing the geomorphology and geological substrate of the sites in question and will pilot the bathymetric survey components along with the PhD student. The student will also become part of the HES funded Citadel project team to learn the direct techniques of mitigation, survey and analysis involved in this major project.

For further project information please contact the lead project supervisor by selecting the first listed name at the top of this advert and sending your enquiry.

ELIGIBILITY:

The student should have a 2:1 or first class UG degree in archaeology, geosciences or a directly related discipline, able to deal with both archaeological and scientific approaches. They will ideally have a MSc degree and knowledge of Scottish heritage and archaeology

Promoting equality, diversity and inclusion is core to the QUARTILES Doctoral Landscape Award. We actively encourage applications from diverse career paths and backgrounds and across all sections of the community, regardless of age, disability, ethnicity, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation and transgender status, amongst other protected characteristics.

We also invite applications from those returning from a career break, industry or other roles. We typically require a minimum 2:1 in your first degree (or equivalent), but exceptions can be made where applicants can demonstrate excellence in alternative ways, including, but not limited to, performance in masters courses, professional placements, internships or employment – this will be considered on a case-by-case basis, and is dependent upon approval from the relevant host institution. We offer flexible study arrangements such as part-time study (minimum 50%), however this does depend on the nature of the project/research so will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

If you have any questions about your eligibility, please email us:

APPLICATION PROCEDURE:

Environmental Sciences (13) Forensic and Archaeological Sciences (16) Geology (18)

Funding Notes

This 45 Month opportunity is open to UK and International students (The proportion of international students appointed to the QUARTILES DLA is capped at 30% by UKRI).

QUARTILES studentships include a tax-free UKRI doctoral stipend (estimated at £19,795 for the 2025/2026 academic year), plus a training grant of £9,000 to support data collection activities throughout the PhD.

QUARTILES does not provide funding to cover visa and associated healthcare surcharges for international students.


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