The Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) is a member of the Helmholtz Association (HGF) and funded by federal and state government. AWI focuses on polar and marine research in a variety of disciplines such as biology, oceanography, geology, geochemistry and geophysics thus allowing multidisciplinary approaches to scientific goals.
Background As an internationally renowned Helmholtz Center for Polar and Marine Research, the
Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) is one of the very few scientific institutions in the world that are equally active in the Arctic and Antarctic. It coordinates German polar research efforts, while also conducting research in the North Sea and adjacent coastal regions in Germany. Combining outstanding research infrastructure, cutting edge field work, and innovative modelling approaches the Alfred Wegener Institute explores nearly all aspects of the Earth system and its biodiversity – from the atmosphere to the ocean floor, from the coasts to the ice-covered seas and adjacent land.
Call for Expression of Interest The Alfred Wegener Institute seeks Expressions of Interest from outstanding talents to apply for their own Investigator Group (
HGF call for application). The two-step process will start with an internal selection process at AWI of
up to three candidates in the
thematic or
open track as specified below. The final selection of candidates will be carried out by an external expert panel advising the president of the Helmholtz Association. HIGs of successful applicants will be hosted at the AWI. Funding is on the order of €300,000 per year for a period of five years, with potential access to further substantial research infrastructure depending in internal negotiation within AWI. The position is limited to
five years and offers access to a
tenure track procedure.
Eligibility You will be eligible to apply if you have between
two and six years of postdoctoral experience (academic age). For maternity / parental leave of the birth giving parent, the track record considered can be extended by 18 months, or if longer by the amount of leave actually taken until the call deadline, for each child born after the PhD award. For parental leave of the parent not giving birth, the track record considered can be extended by the amount of parental leave actually taken until the call deadline for each child born after the PhD award. Parental leave times include periods of part-time work (no more than 25 % paid work), in which you took over the main share of family work. When calculating the academic age, we are guided by the gender-specific clock-stopping policies of the ERC Starting Grant as well as the DFG (number of years of active research after receiving the doctoral degree). Periods of unavoidable downtime of scientific career due to e.g. illness or care leave can also be considered. Further requirements are
international research experience as demonstrated by continuous research stay abroad for at least 6 months during the doctoral or postdoctoral studies and, of course, an exceptionally strong CV and draft proposal addressing one of the following topics for which we seek outstanding experts to strengthen our
research program.
Thematic track
In the first step, up to two candidates will be selected from application to the following themes:
1) Ecology of Antarctic benthic habitats
The HIG conducts research in the field of Antarctic benthic community function. Research interests will target habitat-building megafauna (e.g. sponges, corals), their metabolism and interaction with the biotic and abiotic environment as well as their susceptibility to multiple stressors and climate change. The applicant should be experienced in benthic ecology using field observations with advanced optical, acoustic and geochemical in situ platforms, manipulative experiments in the field and in the laboratory and/or modelling approaches. Broad expertise from shelf to deep sea habitats is an asset.
Information on relevant research at AWI, including contact persons from the AWI scientific section, can be found here.
2) Phytoplankton ecology
The HIG conducts research in the field of phytoplankton ecology, with a clear focus of the central role of phytoplankton in the food web, with strong links to nutrients, microbes and higher tropic levels. The aim of this position is to connect the long-term data, available from the LTER of Helgoland and Sylt to ecological experiments of many different scales with selected phytoplankton species and communities. The applicant should use modern methods in phytoplankton ecology, have experience in experimental phytoplan