Aurora

Employment & Opportunities

PhD Position Opportunity in Aquatic Physics - Linköping University

A PhD position opportunity is available at Linköping University, Sweden, in the field of Aquatic Physics. The project focuses on developing drone-based methods to measure greenhouse gas emissions from lake shorelines.

You can find more information and apply here (deadline: October 9, 2025).

Postdoctoral Fellowship in Earth Sciences - Institut national de la recherche scientifique

Location: Centre Eau Terre Environnement, 490 rue de la Couronne, Québec (Qc), G1K 9A9
Starting date: Mai 2026
Funding: 55 000 CAD per year
Duration: 2 years
Supervisor : Renaud Soucy La Roche | renaud.soucy_la_roche@inrs.ca
Collaborator : Sarah Dare (UQAC)

Research project description

Proterozoic anorthosite suites constitute a potential metallotect for Ni-Cu-Co-EGP deposits (e.g., Voisey’s Bay, Labrador). Almost all of the Proterozoic anorthosite suites in eastern Canada are located in the Grenville Province, where they represent approximately 10% of the area. The largest suites formed at 1.16–1.13 Ga, prior to the Grenville continental collision, but the tectonic context during their formation remains unclear and may have influenced their prospectivity. However, data on metamorphic evolution in the Grenville Province are sporadic, which hinders exploration of mineralization associated with these suites.
The objective of the project is to establish the metamorphic context preceding the emplacement of the Lac-Saint-Jean, Vallant, and Havre-Saint-Pierre–Sheldrake anorthosite suites to test whether multiple geodynamic contexts are required to explain the formation of the 1.16–1.13 Ga anorthosite suites in the Grenville Province. The research will involve a combination of fieldwork in amphibolite to granulite facies metamorphic rocks, detailed petrography (supported by μXRF and SEM-EDS analyses), thermobarometry and/or phase equilibrium modeling, and various petrochronological approaches (in situ U-Pb on monazite, zircon, or xenotime; Lu-Hf on garnet). The postdoctoral fellow will collaborate with a PhD student supervised by Sarah Dare (UQAC), whose work will focus specifically on Ni-Cu-Co-EGP mineralization associated with anorthosite suites, and with geologists from the Quebec Ministry of Natural Resources and Forests.

Required qualifications
- PhD in Earth sciences, geological engineering or equivalent.
- Fieldwork experience in deformed high-metamorphic grade rocks.
- Strong experience in metamorphic petrology and/or petrochronology.
- Fluency in English (reading, speaking, writing)
- Fluency in French is an asset

Commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion

Professor Soucy La Roche encourages all qualified individuals to apply, especially women, members of visible and ethnic minorities, Indigenous Peoples, persons with disabilities, members of LGBTQ2+ communities or others who identify with socially and/or economically marginalized groups. Special circumstances and non-traditional backgrounds will be considered in the evaluation of applications. Professor Soucy La Roche is committed to supervising the candidate in the language of their choice (English or French) to overcome language barriers and to encourage their inclusion in the research team.

Submit an application

Candidates must send their application to Professor Soucy La Roche by email (renaud.soucy_la_roche@inrs.ca). The application package must include the following documents:
- Cover letter describing your experiences and research interests and if needed, explaining any special circumstances relevant to the evaluation of the application
- CV
- Academic transcripts (unofficial)
- Names and contact information of three references

Questions

Candidates are invited to contact Professor Soucy La Roche directly by email with any questions about the project or the study environment.

Faculty Opportunities - Stanford University

Assistant Professor in Civil & Environmental Engineering: Focus is on the frontier of natural hazard and risk engineering with an emphasis on hazard characterization, risk assessment, and/or mitigation strategies for climate-influenced risks, such as flooding, drought, wildfires, landslides, storms, and urban heat, among others. 

Assistant Professor in Oceans: Areas of interest: (1) Oceans and global change (e.g. ocean biodiversity, biological adaptation and resilience, coastal processes and sustainable coastlines, global carbon cycling and sequestration); (2) Ocean technologies and solutions (e.g., ocean observing and remote sensing, marine robotics and automation, data fusion, marine biotechnology, marine carbon-dioxide removal, marine energy, blue foods, pollution and microplastics); and (3) Human dimensions of oceans (e.g. ocean social science, resource economics of fisheries, aquaculture, and other marine sectors,  ocean cultures and heritage, gender studies, marine policy and governance). 

Tenured Professor in Climate Science: Areas of interest include, but are not limited to, the physical processes of the atmosphere and ocean, the feedbacks and nonlinear dynamics that influence climate sensitivity, key risks to human and natural systems, as well as strategies to limit future warming and manage climate-related impacts. 

Openings in other areas can be found here. Please share widely.

Opportunity: SCIE 300 Students Want to Interview You About Your Research

Has your group published in the last 1-2 years? Then please consider volunteering to have your work featured by a team of SCIE 300 students!

We welcome all interested faculty, research associates, postdocs, and graduate students to volunteer.

The time commitment is roughly one hour for an interview. Interviews can be remote and will be scheduled during the week of Nov 3rd at your convenience. They can be with the PI or any group member (graduate student, post-doc, or research associate) who was involved with the publication.

If you are interested, please send a message to our course coordinator (bertram@chem.ubc.ca) by Oct 13th, 2025. Please attach a pdf of the paper you would like to be interviewed about.

Background: SCIE 300 is a Science Communications course offered jointly by Chemistry, Botany, Zoology, and Statistics. In this course, we require teams of 3-4 students to read a current research article, interview one of the authors, and translate the research into outreach pieces (a video, podcast, and blog post). This is a great opportunity for you, a post-doc, or a grad student to practice public outreach, get some exposure for the group, and help keen undergraduates gain some insight into how research is done.

News & Events

MSc Thesis Defense: Dilan Sunthareswaran

From poop to marine soup: deconstructing the diet and health of mussels in a high rainfall coastal region

Date & Time: Friday, October 10, 2025 at 1:00 pm

Location: ESB 5104 & Zoom

Seminar: Along came a spider - weaving the Cambrian origin of chelicerates - October 29, @12 pm

Speaker:   

Dr. Javier Ortega-Hernandez

Associate Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology

Curator of Invertebrate Paleontology in the Museum of Comparative Zoology

Harvard University

Abstract: 

Chelicerates, whose living representatives include sea spiders, horseshoe crabs and arachnids, represent one of the most successful groups of euarthropods, and most of them play a critical role in modern terrestrial ecosystems as obligate predators. Despite their substantial extant diversity and ecological significance, the deep evolutionary origin of chelicerates is highly debated. Several extinct groups have been traditionally regarded as early chelicerate ancestors based on their resemblance to extant horseshoe crabs, most famously the biomineralized trilobites. However, recent discoveries of soft-bodied euarthropods from sites of exceptional preservation in early and middle Cambrian marine deposits around the world suggest that modern chelicerates evolved from a diverse and morphologically disparate ancestral lineage comprising several soft-bodied representatives. Major groups of Cambrian euarthropods implicated in chelicerate origins include the megacheirans, which are typified by the presence of raptorial first appendages, as well as the sanctacaridids, habeliidans, and more recently the mollisoniids. However, none of these taxa convincingly show evidence for the critical shared derived characters (synapomorphies) observed in all modern chelicerates, such as the specialization of the first appendage pair as jacknife or pincer-like chelicerae, or the modification of the opisthosomal limbs into respiratory book gills.

New data on exceptionally preserved fossils from the early Cambrian of South China and mid-Cambrian of North America cast new light on early chelicerate evolution. Through a multi-pronged approach combining micro computed tomography, paleoneuroanatomy, and preparation of museum specimens, it is now possible to fundamentally redefine our understanding of chelicerate origins from Cambrian ancestors. These discoveries demonstrate that the key characters that define extant chelicerates evolved in a complex stepwise pattern, including the organization of the nervous system, the segmental organization of the head, and critically the transformation of the first (deuterocerebral) appendages as the chelicerae. These new insights illuminate the origin of the archetypical chelicerate body plan during the Cambrian Explosion prior to the main diversification of morphologically modern representatives during the Ordovician, and their subsequent major transition into terrestrial environments.

Meetings:

If you would like to meet with Javier, you can sign-up via the Google sheet, or contact Heather Bruce for additional meetings.

There will also be a pizza dinner with Javier at 6:00pm at Uncle Faith's pizza. Please RSVP with your name via the sign-up sheet above.

Location:

This seminar will be hosted both in-person in MSL 102 and via Zoom. The speaker will be presenting in-person. Please remember to not bring any food or drink into MSL.

Zoom webinar link for remote attendees: 

https://ubc.zoom.us/j/9769394469?pwd=YU53NUNUT1VOdExoTkdJaTVWSWxQZz09

Passcode: 808679

It will be possible to ask the speaker questions through the chat or in person. 

Cookies, Coffee and Sushi Lunch:

Before the seminar, there will be cookies and coffee in the BRC atrium starting at 11:30am. Note that our cookie providers for each week are listed online here. Feel free to add your name if there is an empty space!

There will be a lunch Q+A in BRC 224 with the speaker right after the seminar, with sushi provided for participating grad students and post docs.