The University of Bremen at MARUM – Center for Marine Environmental Sciences – is seeking to fill 15 PhD positions starting on January 1, 2026
Job description
The Cluster of Excellence “The Ocean Floor – Earth’s Uncharted Interface” is a joint project of the Universities of Bremen and Oldenburg and a consortium of five partner institutions: Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Center for Polar and Marine Research, Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Leibniz Centre for Tropical Marine Research, Constructor University and the Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg – Institute for Advanced Study.
Funded by the German Excellence Strategy, the cluster quantifies exchange processes at the ocean floor and investigates their role in the Earth system. The cluster’s research portfolio consists of projects that
- decipher the processes that control the transport of biogenic particles to the ocean floor under changing climate conditions,
- balance the transfer of carbon and other elements between the ocean floor and seawater,
- investigate how ecosystems on the ocean floor react to environmental changes and
- develop scenarios for a “warmer world” from climate archives on the ocean floor with the help of climate models.
Along these central research topics, the Cluster offers a structured training for doctoral students in an interdisciplinary framework of marine biogeochemistry, marine geosciences, marine (micro)biology and (paleo)climatology. German Salary Scale 13 TV-L/TVöD at 75% of the regular weekly working hours (29.4 working hours / week) for a fixed-term period of 4 years, until at most December 31, 2029 to obtain a doctorate.
The cluster offers a versatile qualification program in which doctoral researchers can strengthen their professional competence and develop their personal skills. The program offers rich opportunities for interdisciplinary exchange and collaboration across different disciplines of marine sciences, including research stays at partner institutions. Further details on the training program.
In this context, the partner institutions of the cluster invite applications for:
Doctoral researcher positions
- EXC1-01 Carbon Sequestration at the Molecular Level
- EXC1-02 The role of iron cycling in sequestration and remobilisation of organic matter
- EXC1-03 Molecular Gatekeepers of Carbon Sequestration
- EXC1-04 The role of lateral transport in enhancing carbon fluxes to the ocean floor
- EXC1-05 Unraveling the spatio-temporal development of cold-water coral ecosystems
- EXC1-06 Anthropogenic particulate carbon from source to sink
- EXC1-07 Lighting the Way: Metabolic Tracing of Plankton Sugars in Marine Sediments
- EXC1-08 From surface to seafloor: process-oriented modelling of particulate organic carbon
- EXC1-09 Metal-microbe interactions in hydrothermal plumes
- EXC1-10 Deconstructing Arctic hydrothermal systems
- EXC1-11 Nanoscale Interactions of Vent-Derived Particles
- EXC1-12 Deep-sea natural petroleum seeps and hydrothermal systems
- EXC1-13 Forecasting changes in pelagic ecosystem functions in a warmer ocean
- EXC1-14 Determining the pre-anthropogenic baseline of pelagic biodiversity change
- EXC1-15 Decoding feedbacks and thresholds
Follow the links for detailed project descriptions and application requirements. For further information, contact the cluster spokesperson Prof. Heiko Pälike (speaker-exc-oceanfloor@uni-bremen.de) or the responsible researchers of the individual projects.
General Information
They offer:
- A secure salary and statutory health and social insurance.
- In the Cluster of Excellence, doctoral researchers are mentored by a team of experienced scientists and benefit from a large international network of doctoral researchers.
- Flexible working hours, the opportunity to work remotely, and 30 days of vacation.
- Easy access to your workplace by public transport or bicycle.
All partner institutions in the cluster pursue a strategy of diversity. They therefore welcome all applications regardless of gender, nationality, ethnic and social origin, religion/belief, disability, age, sexual orientation, and identity. Disabled persons with essentially equal professional and personal qualifications will be given priority when applying.
You can apply for up to three projects, stating a prioritisation. The application must include a letter of motivation, your CV with certificates, a list of publications (if applicable) and the contact details of two references.
Please send your application with your complete and informative documents, quoting the reference number A179-25, by 25.07.2025 as a PDF file (max. 5 MB) by unencrypted electronic mail to: office-exc-oceanfloor@uni-bremen.de