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Studies

Doctoral Program in Climate Change

General Aims
Doctorate Structure
Lines of Research
Doctoral Thesis Directors
Admission
Contact
Departament in charge of the management of the doctoral programme
Participating departments

General Aims of the Doctorate

The aim of the doctoral programme is that the PhD student joins a research group and participates in active research projects, enhancing the internationalization of their research activities, promoting the transfer of the results of their research in different fields of science and society in general. The programme also aims the training of researchers in the multidisciplinary field of climate change, with a solid methodological basis that may apply to a research specialist in the areas of Climate Change and Impacts Instrumental of Climate Change on Aquatic Ecosystems, and provides the knowledge and skills necessary for the completation of the doctoral thesis.

Structure of Doctorate

The formation period of the doctorate programme is linked to the following Master's degree introduced on the University (in order to the RD 1393/2007):

Master's Degree in Territorial Planning: Information, Tools and Methods

Research Lines and Directors of Doctoral Theses

There are two main lines of research: Climate Change and Impact of Climate Change on aquatic Eco-systems. They are the responsibility of the three units that provide the thesis supervisors: the Department of Geography of the Rovira i Virgili University; the Programme in Aquatic Systems of the Institute for Food and Agricultural Research and Technology (IRTA); and the Ebre Observatory (EO).

CLIMATE CHANGE
Improvement in, and efficient use of, techniques and procedures for retrieving data and metadata about climate and other geophysical data so that they can be transferred more efficiently into digital format:

Location and retrieval of instrumental and climatic data and other geophysical data together with their metadata. Documentation techniques.
Optimization of the processes and techniques for transferring data on paper and other fragile media to digital format. Transfer procedures.
Improvement in techniques for organization, inventory, estimation of data/retrieved image volume, identification of retrieved data.
Validation of retrieved data.

Instrumental reconstruction of the climate and archaeology of data:

Transformation of original units into SI units
Calibration of different standards for observing and measuring climatic data
Time series composition
Creation of relational metadata bases
Determination of environmental influences on climatic records
Development of functions for correcting specific environmental effects

Development of homogenized, quality controlled climate databases:

Improvement in techniques for the quality control of monthly, daily and sub-daily climatic and geophysical data.
Development and application of absolute and relative homogeneity techniques in climate time series on various time scales: monthly, daily and hourly
Generation of software for controlling quality and homogeneity

Development of web databases (regularly interpolated in time and space):

Research into techniques for the space-time interpolation of climatic and geophysical data
Research into, and validation of, web climatology products
Research into, and validation of, instruments for generating web databases

Analysis of variability and climate change on various spatial scales (local, national, subregional, regional, continental):

Detection of the space-time variability of climate in both its mean and extreme behaviour (trend analysis, temporary changes in data distribution, teleconnections, use of techniques based on the Extreme Value Theory, multivariate techniques, etc.)
Attribution of causes of climate change and large-scale forcing factors of climate variability
Climate variability due to natural causes (non-anthropogenic)

Calibration of proxy climate records against instrumental records:

Development and use of techniques for calibrating high time resolution proxy records (historical documentary information, growth rings in trees, other biological testimony)
Development and use of techniques for calibrating low time resolution proxy records (lake and marine sediments, palynological samples, ice cores, others)

Validation of the output of regional climate models:

Validation of output based on statistical and dynamic approaches
Use of future regional climate scenarios

Development of climate services and products:

Creation of regional series for the main climate variables for various spatial scales: local, subregional, national, regional, continental
Contextualization in the framework of the instrumental record of the current climate values on various spatial scales
Development of extreme climate indicators (drought indices, heat wave indices, intense precipitation indices, return periods, etc.)
Preparation of climate indicators for natural and human systems (forest systems, fire risk, water availability, agriculture, energy consumptionon, epidemiological risks, tourism, etc.)

Thesis supervisors (Department of Geography): Manola Brunet India, Enric Aguilar Anfrons, Francisco Javier Sigró Rodríguez, Peter Domonkos, Constanta Emilia Boroneant, Dimitrios Efthymiadis, Juan José Curto, Pere Quintana.

IMPACT OF CLIMATE CHANGE ON AQUATIC ECOSYSTEMS (IRTA and OE)

Impact of climate change on aquatic ecosystems: habitats and species:

Effects of increases in temperature and sea level on deltas and coastal ecosystems.
Techniques for managing and restoring wetlands to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Modelling of ecological processes in continental and coastal water masses under various climate change scenarios.
Analysis of physiological limits and the adaptation of key species to new climate change scenarios (increase in temperature and CO2, changes in salinity, etc.).
Quantitative and qualitative estimations of the effects of climate change on the availability of important habitats for the conservation of key species.

Aquatic organisms as indicators of climate change:

Palaeoclimatic and palaeoenvironmental reconstruction using fossilized aquatic organisms (diatoms, pollen, etc.)
Development of biological indicators sensitive to the impacts of climate change (warming, water stress, salinity, etc.)
Analysis of the resilience of organisms and aquatic habitats to climate change

Impacts of the climate change on the continental hydrologic cicle

Modelling and functioning of the soil-vegetation-atmosphere system in the climate change context

Thesis supervisors (IRTA and EO): Carles Ibáñez, Nuno Caiola, Albert Rovira, Rosa Trobajo, Pere Quintana

Admission

Maximum number of students: 20
Criteria for admission and selection:

The fulfilment of the established conditions, as a requirement of admission in the 19th article and the 4th addicional order of the RD 1393/2007, is necessary to be able to entry at the Doctorate Program while its research mode.

Specific criteria:

The Doctoral Program Committee will evaluate candidates by assessing the Bachelor's or Master's Degree of access (university and country of origin), transcript of qualifications, English language skills, motivation to continue doctoral studies and other merits provided within a short curriculum.