Our Offer
The Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPS) in Göttingen is one of the world's leading research institutions in the field of solar physics and planetary research with around 300 employees. The interdisciplinary research focus is the investigation of the development, diversity and dynamics of planets, moons, small bodies, the sun and solar-like stars. The MPS develops and operates scientific instruments for current and future space missions (e.g. ESA, NASA), and carries out cosmochemical laboratory investigations of meteorites as well as numerical modeling on state-of-the-art supercomputers.
We are offering a
Postdoctoral Position (f/m/d) in Modelling of Planetary and Stellar Signals in Transmission Spectra
within the project “LiVe” funded by the "Pioneering Research – Exploring the Unknown Unknown” program of the Volkswagen Foundation. The project is jointly run by MPS and MIT in collaboration with the MPI for Chemistry and the University of Graz. The first part of the project (led by MIT) aims to establish the possibility of Venus-like exoplanets hosting life not in water, but in concentrated liquid sulfuric acid. The goal of the second part (led by MPS) is to explore whether the biosignature of such life forms could be detected by the James Webb Space Telescope (or in the future by the Extremally Large Telescope) despite the contamination by the magnetic activity of the host star.
Your Tasks
- Modify existing photochemistry codes to assess feasibility of potential biosignatures in the transmission spectra of Venus-like exoplanets.
- Use existing stellar atmospheric codes to model the contamination of these biosignatures caused by the host star and develop an observational strategy to minimize it.
- Publication of the results in scientific journals and presentation at international conferences;
- Preparing telescope proposals.
Your Qualification
- PhD (or soon to be expected PhD) in stellar or exoplanetary physics or a closely related field
- Experience with numerical modelling
- Experience with analyzing the JWST data will be a bonus.
Additional Information
- The position is to be filled as soon as possible and for a period of three years.
- The position is rated EG 13 according to TVöD Bund.
- An individual travel budgets for conferences, etc. will be provided.
- Review of applications will start on 1 October 2024, and continue until the position is filled.
We look forward to receiving your application documents (CV, publication list, statement of research interests - max. 2 pages - and the names and contact details of two scientists willing to provide reference letters). Please submit these via the digital application portal (https://www.mps.mpg.de/career/jobs). If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact Alexander Shapiro (shapiroa@mps.mpg.de) and Nadiia Kostogryz (kostogryz@mps.mpg.de).
The Max Planck Society endeavours to achieve gender equality and diversity. Furthermore, the Max Planck Society seeks to increase the number of women in those areas where they are underrepresented and therefore explicitly encourages women to apply. The Max Planck Society is committed to increasing the number of individuals with disabilities in its workforce and therefore encourages applications from such qualified individuals
