Description of 37 cycle scholarships (2021-2024)

20 scholarships are offered in the 37-th cycle, here is a short description of the research themes. Students will be asked to select one or more scholarships at submission time and during the oral examination

Scholarship 1: Meteorology and atmospheric physics

Exchange processes between surface and atmosphere over complex terrain

The Thesis project will be devoted to develop further understanding of the physical processes occurring at the interface between the surface and the atmosphere in mountain and coastal regions.

The candidate will design novel field experiments to investigate the processes and develop a strategy for data analysis based on numerical investigations.

The scholarship is totally funded by the University of Bologna general budget. The interested candidate can contact for information Prof. Silvana Di Sabatino of the Department of Physics and Astronomy

Scholarship 2: Solid Earth Physics

All aspects of solid earth geophysics, such as seismology, physics of volcanism, geodesy, quantitative geodynamics, tsunami

This scholarship is open to any research topic in the field of solid Earth Physics.

The scholarship is totally funded by the University of Bologna general budget. The interested candidate can contact for information Prof. Paolo Gasperini, Prof. Giorgio Spada or Prof. Silvia Castellaro

Scholarship 3: Adaptation to climate change

Models and engineering for climate change adaptation

Perspective candidates may focus on innovative theories, techniques and solutions for adapting the organisation and management of public services and industrial production to climate change. Focus may be concentrated on the water and transport sectors and industrial risks.

The scholarship is totally funded by the University of Bologna general budget. The interested candidate can contact for information Prof. Alberto Montanari of the Department of Civil, Chemical, Environmental and Material Engineering

Scholarship 4: Cultural Heritage and climate change

Between nature and politics. A genealogy, history and critical analysis of the climate change discourse

At least since Aristotle’s Politics, the question of nature has been ubiquitous in Western political thought which has always revolved around varying conceptions of the nature of human beings, societies and nature itself, as well as of the relationship between men and the natural environment.

 In this perspective, the research aims at contextualizing the contemporary discourse on climate change within the broader question of the relationship between nature and politics, starting from its modern roots and by paying particular attention to the criticisms and complementary approaches (e.g., those elaborated by contemporary Jewish philosophy, ecofeminism, new materialism, etc.), as well as to the processes of politicization and commodification of nature that have emerged throughout the years.

The scholarship is totally funded by the University of Bologna general budget. The interested candidate can contact for information Prof. Annalisa Furia of the Department of Cultural Heritage.

Scholarship 5:  Big Data and climate change

Machine learning approaches for climate variability and predictions

 The fellowship is designed to investigate the possible applications of machine learning methods to the problems of detecting and investigating climate variability at global and regional scale, to analyze how the variability changes under different climate change scenarios. The work will involve analysis of general circulation models simulations and design of specific numerical experiments.

The scholarship is co-funded by the University of Bologna general budget, the Department of Physics and Astronomy and the CMCC Foundation. The interested candidate can contact for information Prof. Antonio Navarra of the Department of Biological, Geological and Environmental Sciences.

Scholarship 6: Food production and resilient agriculture

Aeroponics and Hydroponics for vertical farming

The PhD project will have to address the following objectives:

• Development and validation of aeroponic and hydroponic systems for growing food in vertical farms.

• Optimization of irrigation and mineral nutrition management systems, including through the processing of resource consumption indices and alternative scenarios for the cultivation of vegetable and aromatic species.

• Definition of protocols for the management of irrigation shifts and identification of integrable systems for the dynamic management of water and nutrients through image acquisition and processing.

The scholarship is co-funded by the University of Bologna general budget and the Department of Agricultural and Food Sciences. The interested student can contact for more information Prof. Francesco Orsini of the Department of Agricultural and Food Sciences.

Scholarship 7: Mitigation strategies in a changing climate

Carbon negative strategies for CO2 removal and chemical productions

The target of the scholarship is to provide a significant advancement in the development of new flexible hybrid thermochemical-biological approaches to convert waste biomass and carbon dioxide into carbon neutral and carbon negative chemicals. To this purpose, development/optimization of improved process for carbon dioxide capture and biological utilization will be integrated into new processes in which hydrothermal and dry pyrolysis will be coupled with “pyrotrophic” fermentation.

The scholarship is co-funded by the University of Bologna general budget, the Department of Chemistry "Giacomo Ciamician" and the Department of Industrial Chemistry "Toso Montanari". The interested student can contact Prof. Cristian Torri of the Department of Chemistry "Giacomo Ciamician".

Scholarship 8:  Human health, climate change and well being

One Health solutions for sustainability

An integrated approach to profile the non genetic factors associated with disease and health outcomes is needed because we lack insights that might help us in reducing the burden of non-communicable diseases on society. Emerging human exposome frameworks allow to perform systematic analysis of non genetic factors involved in diseases, such as exposure to chemical and physical agents, dietary constituents as well as lifestyle and psychosocial stressors. In this regard, to overcome the limitations of traditional epidemiological and toxicological studies, new combined approaches of environmental informatic and bioinformatic tools, including network theory and network medicine, will be considered to identify new non genetic factors in disease and disease-related phenotypes at scale.

The scholarship is co-funded by the University of Bologna general budget, the Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine and the Department for Quality of Life. The interested student can contact for more information Prof. Andrea Tarozzi of the Department of quality of Life Studies.

Scholarship 9: Natural hazards and risk analysis

Numerical modelling of slope stability and of landslide triggering in subaerial and submarine environments

Slope failures and landslides are among the most hazardous phenomena in several areas worldwide. Every year, they are responsible for significant loss in terms of human lives and property. Their annual rate of occurrence has increased in the last years and is likely to increase in the next future, especially due to more frequent extreme events connected to the global climate change.

After a review of the physics underlying slope failures processes and of the main numerical approaches already proposed to solve the relevant equations, the successful candidate will refine and further develop a numerical code in use in the DIFA research team funding the scholarship. In particular, the successful candidate will contribute to make the code capable of accounting for 1) different time-independent and time-dependent loading mechanisms, there including seismic loading and extreme weather events, 2) different geological/geomorphological/rheological conditions. The numerical tool developed will be benchmarked against known real-world cases and applied to potential slope instability scenarios in both subaerial and submarine environments. In the case of. ooastal sites, the problem will be investigated also in connection with tsunami generation.

The scholarship is funded by the Department of Physics and Astronomy. The interested student can contact for more information Prof. Alberto Armigliato of the Department of Physics and Astronomy.

Scholarship 10: Climate variability and change

Climate variability and predictability of European temperature extremes

The scholarship is funded by Fondazione Centro Euro-Mediterraneo sui Cambiamenti Climatici (CMCC) and the research work will be carried out at the Climate Simulation and Prediction Division of CMCC in Bologna (the Division is presented here: https://www.cmcc.it/research-organization/research-divisions/climate-simulations-and-predictions). The interested student can contact for more information Dr. Silvio Gualdi of CMCC Foundation (silvio.gualdi@cmcc.it)

Scholarship 11: Ocean predictions and river hydrology

Advanced ocean forecasting in the Southern European Seas: river/ocean interactions and inter-basins exchanges

This PhD research scholarship deals with the understanding of river/ocean interactions processes (e.g. estuaries dynamics, mixing at the river mouth) and their parameterizations in numerical ocean models. Moreover, this PhD will focus on the assessment and modelling of the inter-basins exchanges and dynamics (e.g. Mediterranean Black Sea through Marmara Sea and Greek and Turkish straits).

The final objective is to improve the ocean numerical model and forecasting system of the Black Sea. This project is connected to the Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service (https://marine.copernicus.eu/).

This scholarship is funded by the Foundation CMCC (Centro Euro-Mediterraneo sui Cambiamenti Climatici), Ocean Predictions and Applications Division located in Lecce and the successful applicant will carry out the research in Lecce. The OPA research group is presented here https://www.cmcc.it/research-organization/research-divisions/ocean-predictions-and-applications.

The interested student can contact for more information Dr. Giovanni Coppini of CMCC Foundation (giovanni.coppini@cmcc.it)

Scholarship 12: Ocean predictions and data assimilation

Data assimilation in the regional ocean forecasting systems of the Southern European Seas

This PhD will develop a new ensemble ocean forecasting system with assimilative capacities. The study will focus on the development of advanced numerical techniques for perturbing initial conditions and produce an ensemble of analysis (with data assimilation) to be used to produce ensemble short term forecasts. The ensemble assimilative forecasting methodology will be tested in the Southern European Sea forecasting systems (e.g. Mediterranean and Black Sea) of the Copernicus Marine Service.

This project is connected to the Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service (https://marine.copernicus.eu/).

This scholarship is funded by the Foundation CMCC (Centro Euro-Mediterraneo sui Cambiamenti Climatici), Ocean Predictions and Applications Division located in Lecce and the successful applicant will carry out the research in Lecce.

The OPA research group is presented here https://www.cmcc.it/research-organization/research-divisions/ocean-predictions-and-applications

The interested student can contact for more information Dr. Giovanni Coppini of CMCC Foundation (giovanni.coppini@cmcc.it)

Scholarship 13: Ocean modelling and predictions

Three-dimensional ocean modelling on unstructured meshes

This PhD research scholarship deals with the implementation to the global ocean of an unstructured-grid model currently developed at CMCC for several coastal and regional configurations. The main objectives of the PhD will comprise the optimization of existing meshing approaches adopted at coastal scales (e.g. finest horizontal resolution in shallower areas) to take into account the requirements of the global configuration (e.g. local Rossby radius refinements) and the extension of the model capabilities to improve the physical representation of the large-scale oceanic processes (e.g., gyre circulation, equatorial dynamics, deep water formation and upwelling).

This scholarship is funded by the Foundation CMCC (Centro Euro-Mediterraneo sui Cambiamenti Climatici), Ocean Modeling and Data Assimilation (ODA) Division located in Bologna and the successful applicant will carry out the research in Bologna. The ODA research group is presented here https://www.cmcc.it/research-organization/research-divisions/ocean-modeling-and-data-assimilation. The interested student can contact for more information Dr. Simona Masina of CMCC Foundation (simona.masina@cmcc.it)

Scholarship 14: Historical reconstruction of  extreme events

Historical reconstruction of extreme natural events of the past (earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, etc.)

This PhD research scholarship aims at studying extreme natural events of the past, in particular earthquakes. Historical research will aim to document the material impact of the earthquakes that will be investigated, with the tools of quantitative historical research, while studying the impact on society, cultural responses, communication dynamics. The in-depth study of earthquakes and other extreme natural events will provide an opportunity to investigate which cultural resources societies put in place to deal with these events.

A successful candidate should be able to use the tools of historical research and willing to explore different research environment. The successful applicant, after the courses/training period, will carry out the research at the INGV Laboratory in Bologna.

The scholarship is funded by INGV - Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia. The interested student can contact for more information Dr. Romano Camassi of INGV (romano.camassi@ingv.it).

Scholarship 15: Machine Learning and climate change data

Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning applied to numerical model simulations

Numerical simulations for weather forecast and climatology are crucial to identify specific events and long-term trends. Artificial Intelligence and machine learning will be innovative methods and tools for data analysis in climate science. The requirement to use Artificial Intelligence and machine learning brings the need to have access to a platform (or a number of architecturally different platforms) where the new developments and the new numerical climate models can be tested. Last but not least, power consumption at the level of computing infrastructure should be considered, to ensure the scalability at exascale-class level of performance.

The fellowship is offered by E4 Computer Engineering that has a specific R&D department for developing AI-related applications. The interested student can contact for more information Prof. Nadia Pinardi of the Department of Physics and Astronomy.

Scholarship 16: Natural and man-induced hazards

Temporal and Spatial analysis of ground deformation data in areas exposed to natural and anthropic origin deforming phenomena

Scholarship objective is the time and space characterization of ground deformation by means time series analysis and multivariate statistics methods (and/or machine learning approaches). Main research and operational tools are: Linux and Windows operative systems; Matlab; satellite SAR interferometry technique; multiparametric time series analysis methods. Appreciated additional skills: Python; main ground deformation measurement methods (InSAR and GNSS).

The scholarship is funded by INGV - Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, in the framework of the Italian Ministry of Economical Develoment (MISE) – INGV research project agreement. The interested student can contact for more information Dr. Giuseppe Pezzo of INGV (giuseppe.pezzo@ingv.it).

Scholarship 17:  Industrial doctorate

Position reserved for employees of Curti Costruzioni Meccaniche S.p.a.

Scholarship 18: Industrial Doctorate

Position reserved for employees of Curti Costruzioni Meccaniche S.p.a.

Scholarship 19: Industrial Doctorate

Position is reserved to employees of the International Research Institute for Climate and Society of NY, USA.

Scholarship 20: One Health

One Health relationship between human and Companion animal ocular microbiomes in diverse environment

The purpose of this scholarship is to apply a one health approach in the study of the human and pet’s ocular microbiome interactions with potential transmission of harmful microorganisms with or without clinical disease onset. Results on transient microbiome changes could be applied for applications that may enhance patients’ care and optimize treatment plans with particular attention to antibiotic-resistance. Such enhanced understanding could lead to innovative interventions to prevent and manage a variety of human health and disease states. The study of human and animal health will be framed in the context of different environmental conditions such as weather and pollutants in cities and country side.

The scholarship is funded by the central budget of the University of Bologna and the successful applicant will work at the Dipartimento di Medicina Specialistica, Diagnostica e Sperimentale (DIMES) in collaboration with il Dipartimento di Qualita' della Vita (QuVI) and the Department of Physics and Astronomy (DIFA).  For more information please contact Prof. Piera Versura.