PhD fellowship/scholarship - Methods to evaluate the effect of catch crops on nitrate leaching and load to streams

Applicants are invited for a PhD fellowship/scholarship at Graduate School of Technical Sciences, Aarhus University, Denmark, within the Ecoscience programme. The position is available from 01 May 2025 or later. You can submit your application via the link under 'how to apply'.

Title:
Methods to evaluate the effect of catch crops on nitrate leaching and load to streams

Research area and project description:
You will be involved in a PhD project as part of the project “The effect of targeted catch crops on nitrate load to streams” and another project "NITAGRO: A machine learning approach to predict nitrate leaching at field scale".
The aim of the PhD project is to utilize satellite remote sensing and artificial intelligence techniques to increase our understanding and quantification of crop cover and nitrogen uptake in the autumn and evaluate the effect of catch crops on nitrate leaching out of the root zone and nitrogen loss to streams.

In Denmark, catch crops is part of the present and future targeted emission-based nitrogen regulation. Thus, it is important to quantify the spatial distribution and growth of catch crops, and the potential effect of catch crops on the nitrogen balance. It will provide new knowledge of how well the present inclusion of catch crops are implemented in the nitrogen regulation and develop new methods and tools to evaluate the effects on nitrogen loss under real world conditions.

The PhD project will consist of three parts. First, the PhD student will develop a model to predict nitrogen uptake in cover crops by utilizing satellite remote sensing, environmental variables and artificial intelligence techniques. Second, the student will develop a machine learning model to monitor the spatial distribution of cover crops and their growth across several Danish catchments. And finally, the student will assess how the spatial distribution and growth of cover crops affect the nitrate leaching and stream water nitrogen concentrations in several Danish catchments.

Project description: For technical reasons, you must upload a project description. Please simply copy the project description above and upload it as a PDF in the application.

Qualifications and specific competences:
Applicants to the PhD position must have a relevant Master’s degree. We are looking for candidates within the field(s) of agrobiology, bioinformatics and (or) data science.

Applicants should be familiar with programming in Python and/or R and spatial analysis using GIS. Experience with handling big data, statistics and machine learning is an advantage. The applicant should be interested in both data handling, data analysis and disseminating results.

Place of employment and place of work:
The place of employment is Aarhus University, and the place of work is Department of Ecoscience, C. F. Møllers Allé 3, 8000 Aarhus C., Denmark.

Contacts:
Applicants seeking further information are invited to contact:

• Hans Estrup Andersen, [email protected] (main supervisor)
• Rasmus Rumph Frederiksen, [email protected] (co-supervisor)

How to apply:
Please follow this link to submit your application.

Application deadline is 28 February 2025 at 23:59 CET

Preferred starting date is 01 May 2025

For information about application requirements and mandatory attachments, please see our application guide.

Please note:

• Only documents received prior to the application deadline will be evaluated. Thus, documents sent after deadline will not be taken into account.
• The programme committee may request further information or invite the applicant to attend an interview.
• Shortlisting will be used, which means that the evaluation committee only will evaluate the most relevant applications.

Aarhus University’s ambition is to be an attractive and inspiring workplace for all and to foster a culture in which each individual has opportunities to thrive, achieve and develop. We view equality and diversity as assets, and we welcome all applicants. All interested candidates are encouraged to apply, regardless of their personal background. Salary and terms of employment are in accordance with applicable collective agreement.