Senior Lecturer in Astronomy, orientated towards Galactic Dynamics

The position entails primarily research and teaching at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Research will be conducted at least 60 % of full time. The work assignments of the position, as well as the relative proportions of research, teaching, and administration may change over time. The person is expected to develop active research within the area and related areas, which also includes active work in applying for external funding and developing collaborations with other university units and other governmental organizations involved in this type of research.

Research at Lund Observatory is focused on how the Milky Way formed, evolved and on its current structure. These are central issues in modern astrophysics. Lund Observatory has played a key role in developing the field of space astrometry, firstly, with the HIPPARCOS mission launch in 1989, and later with the Gaia mission, launched in 2013. Gaia is still collecting data today and is creating a revolution in Galactic astronomy based on its catalogue of almost 2 billion stars. Lund Observatory is now embarking on a new project to expand on the success of Gaia by leading proposals for a new space mission, called GaiaNIR. This proposal will widen the wavelength range to the near-infrared to also explore regions of our Galaxy which is hidden by dust and gas.

The lecturer’s research is expected to focus on Galactic Dynamics exploiting the Gaia data to study the dynamical history and future evolution of stellar populations in our Galaxy. Additionally, the lecturer is expected to provide theoretical, statistical, and simulation expertise in the development of the work towards the next generation space astrometry observatory. This work requires new science cases based on the opportunities provided by near-infrared astrometry.

The lecturer is expected to teach in courses at the Bachelor’s and Master’s level, especially within the research area, but also at a more basic level. The new lecturer is expected to be responsible for handling the bachelor theses at the astronomy unit.

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