Quantification of peatland-mediated feedbacks to the climate system

The recent changes in climate and land use patterns have disturbed the Earth's climate-carbon cycle equilibrium. These changes trigger potentially important land-surface feedbacks, which will further modify the Earth's climate. The ongoing changes in peatland carbon balance as a result of climate warming have the potential to strong positive and negative feedbacks to climate, but these impacts are poorly constrained. To assess the importance of these feedbacks, the interactions between peatland carbon cycle and climate should be taken into account. However, the absence of peatlands in current Earth system models limits our understanding of the peatland-mediated feedbacks at different scales. We seek a postdoctoral researcher to work on development an established peatland-vegetation model and couple it to the regional Earth system model. The resultant model will be used to quantify the peatland-mediated feedbacks. The results of model simulations will increase our understanding of land-surface interactions and their impacts on climate and the carbon cycle.