International Doctoral Program at FAU: M³OCCA goes into extension
The Bavarian State Ministry of Science and the Arts has approved funding for a further phase of the International Doctoral Program “Measuring and Modelling Mountain Glaciers and Ice caps in a Changing Climate” (IDP M³OCCA) as part of its Elite Network of Bavaria. The Institute of Geography at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) is coordinating the interdisciplinary and cross-location joint project.
FAU, the Technical University of Munich, the Microwave Institute of the German Aerospace Center in Oberpfaffenhofen and the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities are working together on the program. The aim is to develop innovative methods and technologies to quantify global glacier retreat more accurately over a large area and reduce existing uncertainties. Artificial intelligence techniques are used here, for example in the analysis of large-scale satellite data or to improve physically based process models.
The researchers are also developing pioneering technologies such as radar tomography and geophysical models to enable improved forecasts. “We want to combine glacier retreat with permafrost studies in future ice-free areas,” explains the spokesperson for the program, Prof. Dr. Matthias Braun, Chair of Geography (Remote Sensing and GIS). “In order to obtain reference data, these analyses will also be supplemented with remote sensing data and modeling as well as extensive measurements in the field.”
The FAU’s Pattern Recognition Lab is contributing with the development of AI techniques to analyze radar tomography images.
The Program
From June 2026, nine doctoral students can be funded for four years with funds from the Elite Network of Bavaria. The new funding also includes a postdoctoral position to make it easier for graduates of the current funding phase to become academically independent. M³OCCA is characterized by a high degree of internationality and interdisciplinarity and trains its young scientists in a structured accompanying program in addition to their professional qualifications. In addition to the graduates funded by the Elite Network of Bavaria, doctoral students from other funding lines – such as various junior research groups – may and should also be explicitly integrated into the international doctoral program in order to create a broader scientific and thematic basis and enable a lively exchange.
Excursion to Vernagtferner during the M3OCCA retreat in September 2023 (Photo: Oskar Herrmann).