A postdoctoral position is available at the LISA on the development and validation of a new technique for airborne measurements of oxygenated VOCs.
Research centre: LISA/CNRS, UMR 7583
61, avenue du Général de Gaulle, 94010 Créteil, France.
Contact: Dr Agnès BORBON
Email: / 0033 (0)1 45 17 15 19
Justification:
Volatile Organic Compounds (VOC) and their secondary oxidation products in the atmosphere play a great role on key environmental questions from local scale (air quality, photooxidant pollution, aerosol visibility) to global scale (direct and indirect effect of aerosols on climate). To quantify the impacts of these compounds on atmospheric processes and to provide reliable constraint data for modellers, it is essential to document the speciation of this secondary organic fraction which is quite unknown at present. Our team (GEMPO) has a long and recognized experience in gaseous trace compounds measurements in the ambient air at the LISA (Laboratoire Interuniversitaire des Systèmes Atmosphériques), one of the major French leader laboratory in tropospheric science research. In particular, we are now developing a new offline airborne instrumentation for VOC which includes: an original automatic airborne sampler (AMOVOC) for primary VOC (multiadsorbent tubes) and their secondary oxidation products (liquid stripping coil) associated with various chromatographic techniques at the laboratory. At present, this project permits the measurement of primary nonmethane hydrocarbons and monocarbonyl compounds (ie.formaldehyde). This instrumentation was successfully deployed for the first time during the international programme AMMA in Western Africa on summer 2006. The objective of the postdoc position is to carry on with the development of oxygenated VOC (OVOC) measuring by extending it to a greater number of multifunctional groups (ie.carbonyl, carboxylic and hydroxyl).
Work description:
The research task is planned as follows:
1. Analytical development and sample pre-treatment based on our Combipal/TDAS/GCMS unit
2. Measurement qualification in controlled atmosphere and in the real atmosphere for different field situations in/around Paris (mobile lab MILEAGE)
3. Data treatment and one publication (at least) in an international journal
General conditions:
The successful candidate must have, at least, a PhD in atmospheric sciences (defended before December 2007) based on experimental work on trace gases. An expertise in the analysis of VOCs would be greatly appreciated. The candidate mustn’t be a French native. The starting date is negotiable but no later than January 2008. The position period is planned for nine months. It will be held in Créteil (20 min from Paris centre by metro) with a net monthly salary of 1830euros. We invite candidates to send their application to AgnèsBORBON before July 2007 including a detailed CV, a motivation letter and the name of at least one reference.