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PhD topic proposal A balanced Carbon budget for Lake Geneva

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PhD topic proposal

A balanced Carbon budget for Lake Geneva

Location. Université de Lausanne, Faculté des Géosciences et Sciences de l’Environnement, Switzerland

Specialty. Physical and biogeochemical limnology

Institute. IDYST, Institut de Dynamique des Surfaces Terrestres/ Institute of Earth Surface Dynamics

Supervision. Prof ME Perga (UNIL), in collaboration with Dr T. Lambert

Funding. SNF funding (CARBOGEN project) for 4 years. The contract implies a 20% teaching duty.

Starting Date: April 1st 2018

Deadline for application. December 21st 2017

Keywords. lake, organic carbon, inorganic carbon geochemistry, fluxes, metabolism, priming effect.

Profile and skills required

Master in Geosciences, Geochemistry or environmental sciences Skills in data analysis and limnology.

Research context of the CARBOGEN project

If inland waters have recently been acknowledged as significant reactors of the global carbon cycle, light has been essentially shed on wetlands, permafrost and humic lakes, under the overwhelming paradigm that lake supersaturation with CO2 arises from metabolic processes. Within this picture, large and clearwater lakes have been largely overlooked, considered as neutral to the atmosphere. As a result, our knowledge about the carbon cycle in such lakes is clearly deficient. For instance, in Switzerland, a heuristic carbon budget attempted on the heavily studied and highly monitored Lake Geneva ended up unbalanced, C outputs being twice higher than the inputs. Estimated CO2 outgassing reaches surprisingly high numbers. Rough estimates suggest that the 10 largest Swiss lakes emit as much CO2 as fossil fuel combustion of total Swiss agriculture. The example of Switzerland shows that large and clearwater lakes could be a central feature of a national carbon budget and plead for a revision of our C conception in such environments.
Project CARBOGEN assumes that (1) key processes in lake carbon cycling are inaccurately scaled or remain missing, (2) C is controlled by intricated physical and biogeochemical processes which relative contributions depend on the time and space scales of observation, (3) lakes carbon cycling is highly sensitive to human and climate disturbances. The motive of CARBOGEN is therefore to address the carbon cycle of Lake Geneva through two objectives. The first one is to close the lake carbon budget by refining flux estimates accounting for the large temporal and spatial variability of the carbon processes and by identifying and quantifying missing sources. The second aims at untying the mechanisms behind the long-term C variability, and therefore to quantify the human contribution to such changes. For that purpose, CARBOGEN relies on an integrated, process oriented perspective on the carbon cycle of Lake Geneva, combining field surveys, high-frequency monitoring, bioassays and modelling.

Project description

In the frame of the CARBOGEN project, the PhD candidate will focus on the estimation of dominant C fluxes in Lake Geneva accounting for spatial and seasonal variability. The applicant will rely on two high-frequency monitoring platforms (one inshore and a second off shore), frequent field surveys, and laboratory experiments in order to explore the unconsidered role of inorganic carbon such as non- linear reactions of organic pools. These inputs would finally be upscaled in an attempt to reach a balanced carbon budget.

The PhD candidate is expected to work in strong collaboration with a second PhD candidate from the CARBOGEN project focusing on CO2 variability on short and long-time scales. The project also implies a strong collaboration with A. Borges (University of Liège, Belgium)

Contact details and application

For any questions, contact marie-elodie.perga@unil.ch.
Applications are to be sent directly by e-mail and should include a CV and motivation letter along with the name of three references.

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