Funded PhD on Sediment Dating and the Harappan Civilization
PhD Opportunity in Luminescence Dating of the "Collapse" of the Harappan Civilization
I would be grateful if you would bring this fully funded PhD opportunity to the attention of any potential candidates that you may know:
Re-evaluating the environmental controls of the Harappan Civilization "collapse" using OSL dating of Saraswati river palaeochannels
A three-year Leverhulme funded PhD studentship supervised by Professors Geoff Duller and Mark Macklin, Institute of Geography and Earth Sciences, Aberystwyth University, UK
The Harappan Civilization developed in the Indus Valley of present day Pakistan and India from 2600 to around 1900 BC, synchronous with the cultures of Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. Current research postulates that the Harappan demise was triggered by climate change to drier conditions, yet the underlying cause for this change has yet to be understood. The Hindu holy book (Rig Veda) indicates that a large river named the Saraswati used to flow parallel to the Indus, yet is absent today. The primary aim of this new major multi- national (UK, USA & Pakistan) & multi-institutional project (Universities of Aberdeen, Aberystwyth, London and Newcastle, UK; Woods Hole, USA) is to locate the former Saraswati river in southern Pakistan using remote sensing, aerial photography and ground penetrating radar, and to date abandoned river channels using optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) techniques. These ages will determine for the first time when the Saraswati was an active river, when it ceased to flow and if this corresponds to the demise of the urban Harappan Civilization. It will also constrain whether the Saraswati ceased to flow because of weakening of the monsoon rains or because its headwaters were captured into the neighbouring Sutlej or Yamuna systems.
We are looking for a student with an upper second or first class (or equivalent) undergraduate and/or masters degree in Archaeological, Geographical, Earth or Environmental Sciences to undertake PhD research on developing an OSL chronology for Holocene river development in the Indus Valley. The PhD is available immediately and the successful student must be in post by early 2008 in order to participate in the first field season in February 2008. The stipend is £12,228 pa plus fees (£3,240). Applicants should email their letters of application (including the names of two referees) and CVs to both Professor Geoff Duller (ggd@aber.ac.uk) and Professor Mark Macklin (mvm@aber.ac.uk) and it is expected that interviews will take place in late November/early December 2007.
Professor Geoff Duller
Institute of Geography and Earth Sciences
University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Ceredigion SY23 3DB U.K.
Phone: +44-1970-622611
Fax: +44-1970-622659
E-mail: ggd@aber.ac.uk
Thursday, November 8, 2007
