PhD programmes - Science and Technology

Details about funded positions - 39th Cycle - Curriculum 2

(2A) Study of the effects due to solid-gas mechanical coupling between the lithosphere and the atmosphere in the case of earthquakes of different intensities - E66E23000110001

Funding institution: University of Trento
Doctoral site: University of Trento – Department of Civil, Environmental and Mechanical Engineering    
Contact: Prof. Nicola M. Pugno [nicola.pugno [at] unitn.it] - Prof. Dino Zardi [dino.zardi [at] unitn.it] - Prof. Roberto Battiston [roberto.battiston [at] unitn.it]
Funds: NRRP, M4C1 inv. 4.1, NRRP research
Mobility abroad: compulsory, minimum 6 months
Periods in companies/research centres/public administrations: optional

In recent decades, efforts by the scientific community in searching for earthquake signatures in atmospheric, ionospheric and magnetospheric media have grown rapidly. The increasing amount of good quality data from ground stations and satellites has allowed the detection of anomalies with high statistical significance, such as perturbations in ionospheric plasma density and/or variations in atmospheric temperature and pressure. However, the identification of a causal link between the observed anomalies and their possible seismic triggering has so far been difficult due to the issues in the modelling of a solid-gas mechanical coupling, including soil/source fracture mechanics, ground surface motion and gas interaction (normal/pressure and shear/friction waves). As such, this will be the focus of the present study.
The training and research activity include:

  • learning the use of the MILC model concerning the interaction of lithosphere, atmosphere, ionosphere and magnetosphere;
  • development of a mathematical model of solid-gas and liquid-gas interaction to describe the surface-atmosphere coupling in the presence of a rapid motion (earthquake, tidal wave)
  • analytical and numerical implementation of the model in the MILC code
  • verification of the MILC model with experimental cases of earthquakes using seismometric and lithospheric data corresponding to earthquakes recorded in the INGV database

(2B) Evolution of the system GEOframe/OMS3/CSIP for the building of a Digital Twin of the Hydrology of river Po - E66E23000170001

Funding institution: University of Trento
Doctoral site: University of Trento – C3A – Center for Agriculture Food Environment    
Contact: Prof. Riccardo Rigon [riccardo.rigon [at] unitn.it]
Funds: NRRP, M4C1 inv. 4.1, Public Administration scholarships
Mobility abroad: compulsory, minimum 6 months
Periods in companies/research centres/public administrations: compulsory, minimum 6 months

The D4M (Digital eARth Twin of Hydrology – DART – for the Mediterranean region) PhD project regards to systematize the data collecting and modelling effort to estimate the droughts impact of the climate change on the Mediterranean area. This PhD is intended to bring substantial improvements to the existing GEOframe/OMS3 infrastructure applied to the Po and Adige River case study, in order:
• to give researchers sound tools based on Earth Observations on which to base their analysis of climate, hydrologic, pedological, ecological and agronomic droughts.
• to give API and web services to final users, researchers, technical professionals, programmers, to connect their studies and products to the whole D4M, thus combatting the fragmentation of hydrological modelling through a participatory open platform.
This project will equip the public administration with tools to deal operationally with water crises. The aim of the project is to develop research activities in the field of methodologies and technologies based on artificial intelligence and machine learning for the automatic analysis of remote sensing data acquired by satellites and/or drones for planetary exploration and/or Earth observation. The activity will focus on the development of deep learning techniques, possibly integrated with traditional methods based on physical models, for the automatic extraction of information from data. Methodological development is aimed at defining and implementing techniques adapted to the specific characteristics of remotely sensed images.
In addition to the didactic aspects of the specific doctoral course, training activities include: 1) the study of literature on the use of artificial intelligence techniques in the field of remote sensing; 2) the identification of relevant methodological gaps; 3) the definition of innovative data processing techniques and their algorithmic implementation; 4) testing on real data and applications. A 6-month internship at e-Geos is envisaged as part of this course, which will enable the PhD student to deepen the application/industrial aspects of the methodological activity developed at the university.
There is active a common project with the basin Authority of river Po for the implementation which has now gained momentum from the scientific point of view. For its passage to a low TRL to a higher one, several improvements in the informatics currently used, which is effective but research oriented, must be pursued as defining workflows and protocols (API) for interfacing tools and models. There is a first basic challenge to be pursued and it is to integrate petabytes of data in an efficient processing, and at least a second one, to make the infrastructure participatory and possibly being dispatched trough the web, according to the design principles illustrated in Rigon et al., 2022.

(2C) Solar Wind – Magnetosphere – Ionosphere coupling for different solar conditions - E66E23000110001

Funding institution: University of L’Aquila
Doctoral site: University of L’Aquila - Department of Physical and Chemical Sciences
Contact: Dott. Mirko Piersanti [mirko.piersanti [at] univaq.it]
Funds: NRRP, M4C1 inv. 4.1, NRRP research
Mobility abroad: compulsory, minimum 6 months
Periods in companies/research centres/public administrations: optional

The research activity will study how the different solar conditions impacts on the magnetosphere-ionosphere system dynamic in terms of both current systems able to damage national electric power systems at ground, and particle flux in the circumterrestrial environment able to damage satellites in orbit.

(2D) Space physics and Sun-Earth relations E66E23000110001

Funding institution: University of Calabria
Doctoral site: University of Calabria – Department of Physics - Cosenza    
Contact: Prof. Vincenzo Carbone [vincenzo.carbone [at] fis.unical.it]
Funds: NRRP, M4C1 inv. 4.1, NRRP research
Mobility abroad: compulsory, minimum 6 months
Periods in companies/research centres/public administrations: optional

The Sun determines the physical conditions of the heliosphere and near-Earth space, and acts as the main engine on the climate of our planet. Fluctuations in the magnetic field modulate the conditions of the interplanetary space, the fluxes of solar energetic particles (SEP) and cosmic rays, the UV component of the solar spectrum and coronal mass ejections (CME). These events are associated with the origin of magnetic storms, which have important effects on our technological society, and possibly to changes the climate conditions through complex interactions with the Earth's atmosphere. The PhD project concerns the nature of variability of solar activity, the physics of interplanetary space, including the effects on Space Weather and Earth's climate through the analysis of data obtained from observatories in space and ground-based, through the construction of theoretical models, and through direct numerical simulations of the basic physical processes, not excluding AI techniques.

(2E) Artificial intelligence algorithms for space data analysis in the heliosphere

Funding institution: Italian Space Agency
Doctoral site: University of Calabria – Cosenza & Italian Space Agency
Contact: Prof. Francesco Valentini [francesco.valentini [at] unical.it] - Dr.ssa Denise Perrone [denise.perrone [at] asi.it]
Funds: Own Funds
Mobility abroad: compulsory, minimum 6 months
Periods in companies/research centres/public administrations: optional

Turbulence in plasmas involves a complex cross-scale coupling of fields and distortions of particle distributions. How the energy stored at large scales cascades all the way down to kinetic scales and how turbulence interacts with particles remains one of the major unsolved problems in plasma physics. The heliosphere is the best natural laboratory to study in-situ plasma turbulence. However, due to the limited capacity of the storage disks on board spacecraft and of the data transmission speed to ground, it is necessary to perform a selection of scientific data to be transmitted, while a massive part of information is irretrievably lost.
The proposed idea, covering areas from solar and heliospheric physics to space weather, is to develop a strategy to make a significant step forward in overcoming this difficulty, making these operations automatic through the use of machine learning algorithms. Moreover, the approaches based on the use of artificial intelligence algorithms, which need to be trained by using previous mission measurements and tested through numerical simulations, would have significant impact also in the physical interpretation of measurements.

(2F) Data analysis, instruments and modeling for the study of Space Weather events: from Gamma to near infrared - E66E23000110001

Funding institution: University of Roma Tor Vergata
Doctoral site: University of Roma Tor Vergata    
Contact: Prof. Francesco Berrilli [berrilli [at] roma2.infn.it]
Funds: NRRP, M4C1 inv. 4.1, NRRP research
Mobility abroad: compulsory, minimum 6 months
Periods in companies/research centres/public administrations: optional

The solar activity is at the origin of Space Weather events (SWE) that impact on space and terrestrial technological infrastructures. Space Weather is the term used to describe the dynamic and constantly changing conditions in the Earth's space environment, an environment that will extend to the Moon and Mars in the next years. The thesis focuses on the most recent experimental and data analysis techniques related to the study of the Sun and the physical processes underlying the SWEs. The data available from recent missions (e.g., Solar Orbiter) and from ground-based telescopes (DKIST, Gregor, HARPS-N, etc.) allow an in-depth study of the Sun. The UNITOV team is involved in the solar mission (SunCube One) and in the operations of synoptic telescopes such as the TSST and LOCNES at TNG, operating from Gamma to NIR. The student will have an advanced training in instrumentation and data analysis which will allow an easy placement in major scientific institutes involved in heliophysics.

(2G) Space Weather studies by detection of high energy particles in the magnetosphere - E66E23000110001

Funding institution: University of Roma Tor Vergata
Doctoral site: University of Roma Tor Vergata    
Contact: Prof.ssa Roberta Sparvoli [roberta.sparvoli [at] roma2.infn.it]
Funds: NRRP, M4C1 inv. 4.1, NRRP research
Mobility abroad: compulsory, minimum 6 months
Periods in companies/research centres/public administrations: optional

This thesis work is focused on the analysis of high energy particles (protons, electrons, light nuclei) detected in the magnetosphere by instruments placed in space. The WIZARD physics group of the Physics Department of Tor Vergata University, proposing the thesis, has been engaged for more than 30 years in the construction and launching of space detectors, specialized in the detection of high energy particles. In particular, the thesis work will focus on the analysis of particle fluxes in correlation with solar activity in the context of Space Weather, by means of detectors currently in data taking.