Function and Responsibilities:
Senior researcher (permanent since August 2024)
Research Interests:
During my career, I have focused on high-resolution (annually-) laminated records as archives of environmental changes, either on the continent or in the ocean. I am particularly interested in the relationships between the terrestrial and marine realms, how they influence each other and how initial forcing are either exemplified or buffered by these complex interactions.
I mostly focus on the Quaternary and the role of interactions in the climate-environment-human nexus are one of my main research interests. In that respect, I value co-operation with other disciplines (such as with archaeologists and social scientists) to build more comprehensive pictures of human-climate interactions.
I study sedimentary processes along the source-to-sink pathway: sediment generation and transportation, response of ecosystems to climatic changes, sediment deposition and post-depositional alteration through diagenesis.
My main research focuses are:
- Quaternary record of paleoenvironmental changes
- Sediments as high-resolution climate archives
- Ocean-continent linkages
- Relationships between climate, erosion, vegetation and precipitation (threshold & feedback processes)
- Climate-environment-human nexus
Career:
- 2018-now Research scientist at GFZ (80-100%)
- Research scientist in the STEEPclim project, PI of the Rain6K project, Co-PI of the Warm-Hydro project
- Scientific coordinator of the Varved Sediment Database (VARDA)
- PI of the PRO-HYDRO project (Hydroclimates of the Dead Sea during the early Holocene) - funded by the DFG
- Reintegration grant “Annual Nile floods during the African Wet Period” – funded by GFZ Potsdam
- 2017–2018 Assistant Professor (Freie Universität Berlin) (6 months, 50 %)
Time outside academia (5 years):
- 2015–2017 Project manager for the Green-Win Horizon 2020 project (Global Climate Forum Berlin) (2 years, 50 %)
- 2013-2015 Family leave, further training “Project manager wind energy” (Proventus)
Previous postdoc positions:
- 2010-2013 Postdoc fellow GEOMAR Kiel & NIOZ Texel (3 years, 80 %)
- Permanent position for the project HOSINIL (Past Climates and Environments in the Nile Basin) – funded by DFG
- PI-Project IODP Bering Sea (Paleoceanography of the Bering Sea during the Last Glacial Cycle) – funded by the DFG
- 2008-2010 Post-doc in the West Nile Delta project (GEOMAR Kiel (sponsored by RWE-Dea) (1 year, 50 %)
- 2006-2008 Post-doc in the research training group EUROPROX (University of Bremen) (2 years, 100 %)
Education:
- 2002–2006 PhD in Earth Sciences, CEREGE, Université Aix-Marseille III
“Palaeoclimatic and palaeoceanographic changes at the Northwest American margin during the last glacial-interglacial cycle”
Supervision: Prof. Nicolas Thouveny & Prof. Laurence Vidal
- 2001–2002 Master's in Earth Sciences CEREGE, Université Aix-Marseille III
Projects:
Research Boards and Committees: