We are looking for three outstanding candidates for PhD positions at the Anton Pannekoek Institute for Astronomy at the University of Amsterdam.
Pebbles are the critical ingredient of all current planet formation models. Pebbles are large, compacted dust aggregates that are supposed to form early on in protoplanetary disks, and huge amounts of them with very specific properties are needed. All current models simply assume they exist with maximum abundance. Do they really exist? How are they made? Do they have the properties needed to actually jump-start and accelerate planet formation?
The ERC project GT4Pebbles (Ground Truth for Pebbles) will answer these questions with a program of rigorous dust aggregation modeling, based on the results of a new and revolutionary experiment. We are building the experiment with our partner Prof. Jürgen Blum at the Technische Universität Braunschweig (Germany), the leading laboratory for this type os studies. This job advertisement is for three PhD positions at the University of Amsterdam, to do the advanced modeling. Each PhD student will work in close collaboration with the other students in the group, and with the laboratory group in Braunschweig, from where we will get the input of physical properties needed in the modeling. Become part of an exciting, interdisciplinary, international team (https://gt4pebbles.eu) that is tackling one of the most important questions in planet formation.
If you would like to work on GT4Pebbles, please indicate this in your cover letter, including an intended starting date.
The three projects are:
PhD Position 1: A collisional model for dust aggregates, based on continuum mechanics.
PhD Position 2: Dust Aggregation with full treatment of Porosity, Mass, and Compaction.
PhD Position 3: Interaction of Light with Large Porous Dust Aggregates and the Link to Observations.
For a description of the positions follow this link .
For information about the timeline and process, follow this link.
For more general information about the positions and in order to apply, go to this link .

Credit: Dominik.