Description
MSCA-PF: Joint application at the University of Granada. Department of Stratigraphy and Paleontology.
Professor Antonio García-Alix, from the Department of Stratigraphy and Paleontology at the University of Granada, welcomes postdoctoral candidates interested in applying for a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship (MSCA-PF) in 2026 at this University. Please note that applicants must comply with the Mobility Rule (for more information about the 2026 call, please consult this link).
Brief description of the institution:
The University of Granada (UGR), founded in 1531, is one of the largest and most important universities in Spain. With more than 57,000 undergraduate and postgraduate students and almost 7,000 members of staff, the UGR offers 97 undergraduate degrees, 157 master’s degrees (7 of which are double degrees) and 28 doctoral programmes via its 124 departments and nearly 50 centers. Accordingly, the UGR offers one of the most extensive and diverse ranges of higher education programmes in Spain.
The UGR has been awarded with the "Human Resources Excellence in Research (HRS4R)", which reflects the institution’s commitment to continuously improve its human resource policies in line with the European Charter for Researchers and the Code of Conduct for the Recruitment of Researchers. The UGR is also internationally renowned for its excellence in diverse research fields and ranked among the top Spanish universities in a variety of ranking criteria, such as national R&D projects, fellowships awarded, publications, and international funding.
The UGR is one of the few Spanish Universities listed in the Shanghai Top 500 ranking - Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU). The 2025 edition of the ARWU places the UGR in 301-400th position in the world and as the 3-8 highest ranked University in Spain, reaffirming its position as an institution at the forefront of national and international research. From the perspective of specialist areas in the ARWU rankings, the UGR is outstanding in Mathematics, Artificial Intelligence and Dentistry & Oral Sciences (ranked between 51th-75th position), Computer Science & Engineering, Education and Hospitality & Tourism Management (between 76-100th position), and in the areas of Food Science & Technology and Business Administration (between 101-150th position). A little lower in the ranking, the UGR also stands out in the areas of Earth Sciences, Law, Management, Nursing, Psychology and Statistics, in which the UGR is positioned in the 151-200th position.
Additionally, the UGR counts with 4 researchers at the top of the Highly Cited Researchers (HCR) list, most of them related to the Computer Science and Mathematics scientific areas. It is also well recognised for its presence in the top 200 Universities in Europe at 83th place.
Internationally, the University of Granada is firmly committed to its participation in the calls of the Framework Programme of the European Union. For the duration of the prevoius Framework Programme, Horizon 2020, the UGR obtained a total of 124 projects with a total funding of more than €30 million. For the current Framework Programme, Horizon Europe, the UGR has obtained 136 projects, so far, with a total funding of more than €38 million.
Brief description of the Centre/Research Group:
The general research theme of our group is the reconstruction of the physical and biological conditions of ancient environments in order to assess their response to past climatic fluctuations. In this way, we can understand the past, the present and predict future global environmental changes. We develop these studies from three main (multiproxy) points of view:
- Paleoecological and paleoenvironmental studies of fossil mammals. The combination of traditional paleontological and cutting-edge geochemical approaches allows us to better understand the diets and trophic relationships of Neogene and Quaternary mammals, as well as the paleoenvironments where they lived.
- Paleolimnology (reconstruction of paleoenvironments and paleohydrology from lake records). Our group studies Quaternary paleolimnological records from different latitudes, such as southern Iberia, northern England and Scotland, to understand changes in vegetation, paleohydrology and paleotemperatures using multiproxy approaches (i.e., pollen, geochemical, charcoal or sedimentological analyses).
- Anthropogenic impact on the environment: This was a spin-off from the previous one, and is increasingly important to our group, as it is essential to quantify human impact on the natural background to decipher between natural and anthropogenic environmental/climate changes. We use similar proxies to the previous line, but focused on the last 2000 years.
Project description:
The candidate will develop his/her research in the line of “Reconstruction of past environments”, including paleoclimate and paleohydrology. The candidate will use sedimentological and/or geochemical methods. The study of the relationship between natural environmental background and anthropogenic impact on past environments (following a multiproxy approach) would be a potential topic for the candidate. For example, our research has identified one of the oldest lead pollution records in Europe, related to ancient mining and metallurgical activities, by analyzing heavy metals in lake sediments. We are also developing new paleoenvironmental indicators using compound-specific biomarkers. Thus, we are testing the identification of livestock development in different regions through the analyses of specific fecal compounds in sediments, the use of long-chain diols/GDGTs to reconstruct paleotemperatures, the analyses of deuterium and carbon isotopes in leaf waxes (mainly n-alkanes) to reconstruct past hydrology, or the study of Saharan dust inputs in European lakes. These state-of-the-art approaches are useful tools in both sedimentary records and archaeological contexts.
The candidate will join a very dynamic group with experience leading national and international peleoenvironmental projects. We also have experience supervising Marie Curie fellows. This research covers the latest trends in research and development (I+D) of the European Union, i.e. the Horizon Europe Work Programme 2030 of the EU: Climate Science. Therefore, this research it is very likely to be funded at national and international levels.
Research Area:
- Environment and Geosciences (ENV)
For a correct evaluation of your candidature, please send the documents below to Professor Antonio García-Alix (agalix@ugr.es):
- CV
- Letter of recommendation (optional)
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