Job Description

Application Deadline: 29th September 2023

How to apply:

Funding is provided by the University of Manchester MADSIM Doctoral Training Initiative. The minimum stipend for 2023/24 is \xc2\xa318,622 full time equivalent for all UoM funded PGRs. This project is open to UK students or EU students with settled status. The duration of the PhD is 3.5 years and the start date is January 2024.

Project Background: Extraterrestrial material sourced asteroids or planetary bodies collides with the Earth on a daily basis, but when the colliding objects are large enough and coherent enough, they survive the atmospheric entry and can be recovered on the ground as a meteorite rock sample we can collect and analyse in our laboratories. The UK has several meteor observation camera networks set up to observe such meteorite fall events.

The different phases of meteoroid atmospheric entry include luminous flight (when the meteor is being ablated and burning up and is emitting a bright light as it first enters the atmosphere), fragmentation (flash event when the body breaks up), and dark flight (when the meteor stops burning up and drops to Earth). Each of these phases can be effected by local atmospheric conditions and observing the fall event through these stages relies on multi-positional observation techniques. Observing the trajectory of the incoming object is scientifically useful to understanding how big the object was when in space (meteoroid size), where its source region in the solar system is (orbit), and to determine the mechanical strength profile of the body and strewn field of the surviving meteorite fragments. The latter is notably critical to the rapid recovery of the meteorite, with the application of the research findings ensuring that samples are collected quickly to maintain their scientific integrity.

Project goals: This project will use real world data from different fireball networks (mostly using the French FRIPON / UK SCAMP meteor camera networks, which UoM and the NHM partners are a part of) and other available complementary datasets, to identify and analyse sources of systemic error in the various existing methods of fireball trajectory and mass estimation.

The student will systematically review the modelled pre-atmospheric fireball orbits, to correlate the observed meteoroid physical properties to orbital source regions of present-day fireball events. These real world datasets will help to develop and iterate models of the orbital pathways that result in delivery of material from particular orbits/planetary bodies, and to ask why systematic errors in the datasets used might induce bias in meteorite recovery potential. Mathematically, the project could be considered part of \'Uncertainty Modelling\'. This is because the observational data will help parametrise the deterministic (and assumption heavy) modelling that is currently used to predict and explain the flight of a meteoroid as it passes into, and through, the atmosphere.

The broader goals of the project are to develop a novel end-to-end single approach to combine optical, acoustic, Doppler radar, and other types of fireball records to model accurate predictions of meteorite fall zones in the future and facilitate rapid recovery of meteorites.

Before you apply:

Please contact:

• Prof Katherine Joy
• Dr Geoffrey Evatt

with CV and transcripts to discuss the application prior to applying.

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