This PhD project will be focusing on improving our understanding of the influence presence and absence of permafrost has on greenhouse gas exchanges (GHG) at high latitudes with particular attention to methane. It will use established measurement sites as well as where necessary establish new sites to study specifically the seasonal dynamics and how they differ in permafrost environments compared to other northern areas. Some emphasis will be on shoulder season and winter processes as our research group recently have discovered some very interesting and poorly understood emission patterns during these seasons in permafrost environments. The project will produce measurement based regional upscale estimates for seasonal dynamics of large scale emissions to be compared with atmospheric observations and modeling. Where appropriate the project will also work on improved process understanding of permafrost dynamics in controlled environment facilities specially designed for such experiments present in the Lund laboratories.

The job will involve substantial amounts of field work during all seasons in cold environments. The work will be focusing on flux measurements of GHGs (primarily CO2 and CH4 but possibly also N2O) using gas chromatographic, IR and laser techniques. Candidates with prior experience with ecosystem atmosphere flux measurements (chamber and/or eddy covariance) under field conditions will therefore be preferred.