The PhD positions are part of the European Training Network TERRANOVA (H2020 ITN) in which 15 PhD fellows will collaborate to increase long-term understanding of landscape histories and land use strategies in Europe.The main objective of this ESR project is to provide a better understanding of the landscape settings during the Energy Regimes 1 & 2 of the TerraNova ITN in the pre-industrial period (early to mid-Holocene) and provide other collaborators of the project with a digital Atlas of land-cover change throughout the selected time periods.  Even if the general evolution of human pressure on the environment is clear, there is considerable uncertainty in the understanding of the climate and land-cover variability (at century timescales) and its spatial variability (across the European continent).

The ESR will make use of a recently developed spatial downscaling technique within an Earth System model (iLOVECLIM) to perform climate and land-cover evolution simulations (with the CARAIB land surface model) at high resolution over continental Europe.  The ability of this technique to zoom into one region though retaining the global physical coherency of the climate system is a major new step forward that will allow the ESR to progress rapidly into new ground.

These PhD projects will be jointly supervised by three supervisors. Three secondments will take place: to University of South- Eastern Norway (prof Renssen) to the climate modelling group, to University Leiden (NL, prof Kolen), to relate human subsistence strategies to climate history, and to Landscape Research & Management (UK, dr Howard) to understand the relationship between applied consultancy and research dealing with landscape and archaeology.

PhD postitions at the VU:

PHD GAMIFICATION AND GAME-BASED LEARNING FOR COLLABORATIVE HERITAGE PLANNING

PHD POSITION 'HERITAGE-AS-LANDSCAPE AND ITS SOCIO-POLITICAL DRIVERS'

PHD POSITION 'INNOVATIVE GOVERNANCE SYSTEMS FOR FUTURE HERITAGE PLANNING'

PHD POSITION 'MODELING LAND COVER CHANGE IN EUROPE OVER CURRENT AND PAST ENERGY REGIMES: THE COMBINED EFFECTS OF CLIMATE AND ANTHROPOGENIC ACTIVITIES ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF EUROPEAN LANDSCAPES'

PHD POSITION 'LANDSCAPE MANAGEMENT AND TRADE-OFFS BETWEEN CULTURAL HERITAGE, BIODIVERSITY AND LANDSCAPE FUNCTIONS'