The department of Coastal Systems (COS - location Texel), and the department of Estuarine and Delta Systems (EDS – location Yerseke) are looking for two highly motivated postdoctoral researchers with a background in marine ecology, biogeochemistry and/or hydrodynamics and numerical modelling. You will work on the local or shelf-sea scale transport and sequestration of marine carbon in the Norwegian Trench and wider North Sea, considering oceanographic physical transport mechanisms and pelagic and benthic biogeochemical processes including primary production, sinking and resuspension, burial and remineralisation. Focal points will be quantifying the long-term burial of particulate carbon in the sediments of the Norwegian Trench and export of carbon to the Atlantic Ocean.

Postdoc 1: Local-scale modelling: Model improvement and parameterization

The postdoc position located at EDS (Yerseke, the Netherlands), will focus on ecological and biogeochemical model development and improvement, including benthic and pelagic processes, on the local scale in the Norwegian Trench in the North Sea. New model formulations, and parameterizations will be implemented and tested in a simplified physical framework and matched against project data. This post-doc will evaluate the carbon fluxes and budgets on the scale of the field measurements, i.e. focusing on primary production processes, organic matter sinking, incorporation into the sediment and diagenetic alteration.

Postdoc 2: Regional-scale modelling: Northsea-wide fluxes and budgets of carbon

The second postdoc position, located at COS (Texel, the Netherlands), will focus on physical oceanography and physical-ecological modeling at the regional scale. This post-doc will incorporate improved model formulations into a regional coupled hydrodynamics‐ecosystem model, and will reevaluate the carbon fluxes and budgets for the North Sea area, focusing in particular on the role of benthic‐pelagic carbon exchange processes in the North Sea including the Norwegian Trench, and on the pelagic carbon exchange of the North Sea with the Atlantic Ocean. Furthermore, this postdoc will investigate the general principles of shelf‐ocean carbon exchange using idealized shelf‐sea geometries that represent other temperate regional seas to support global modeling work.

The two postdoc positions are part of a 'model train'. They will work closely together with each other and with a PhD candidate based at University of Groningen who will set up a global-scale model to assess shelf-sea carbon contributions to the global ocean.

While the post-docs will be based either at EDS (Yerseke) or at COS (Texel), we foresee regular visits between these two labs, and also to University of Groningen to facilitate knowledge exchange between the PhD-candidate, the two postdocs and their supervisors. Both postdocs will also cooperate with several other PhD candidates and postdocs working on the NoSE project on field observations and interpretation.

The ideal candidate for Post-doctoral research position (1), local-scale modelling, has a PhD in oceanography, biology, or biogeochemistry, with an affinity for numerical modelling. The ideal candidate for Post-doctoral research position (2), regional modelling, has a PhD in oceanography or a related science, experience with developing and applying numerical flow models, and affinity with marine ecology/biogeochemistry.

Given the interdisciplinary nature of the work, it is important that the Postdoc-candidates are open and communicative to facilitate interactions with other members of the group and the project consortium. Excellent English oral and writing skills are essential.

We highly encourage applicants from all members of our community and of diverse background, including LGBT+ and BAME communities, to join us.

We are offering a 3 year full-time Postdoc position. Employment of this position at Royal NIOZ is by NWOI (The Netherlands Organization of Scientific Research). The salary is compliant to the CAO-OI (Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Research Institutes) scale 10 or 11 depending on relevant experience. Furthermore NIOZ offers a pension scheme, a holiday allowance of 8% of the gross annual salary, a year-end bonus of 8,3% of the gross annual salary, flexible work arrangements and 42 days of holiday leave (fulltime position).

You may expect attractive secondary employment conditions. We offer generous relocation expenses for employees coming from abroad and support with finding accommodation.

The North Sea-Atlantic Exchange (NoSE) Project

The North Sea is a highly productive and heavily exploited continental shelf sea that absorbs significant quantities of atmospheric CO2. But the fate of absorbed CO2 is highly uncertain, in particular the balance between outflow into the Atlantic Ocean and burial in sediments, so we cannot accurately project how this may change in the future. In the NoSE project, a multidisciplinary consortium of researchers (from NIOZ, Delft University of Technology, University of Groningen, Utrecht University, and several international partners) will determine the past, present and future role of the North Sea within the wider biogeochemical system of the Atlantic Ocean. Focusing on the Norwegian Trench, which is both the main outflow route to the Atlantic Ocean and the main place where sediments accumulate within the North Sea, we will investigate the transport and conversion processes that regulate carbon and nutrient exchange between the land, shelf sea and open ocean through a combination of oceanographic research expeditions and computer modelling. By linking these results to the palaeo record from seafloor sediments, NoSE will reveal new insights into how the cycling of carbon and nutrients in the North Sea and their exchange with the Atlantic Ocean have varied over the past thousands of years and how they may continue to evolve in the future.