M. Sc. Elena Macdonald
Research Interests:
- Heavy tail behaviour of extreme value distributions of flood discharge time series
- Event and catchment characteristics as controls of heavy tail behaviour of extreme value distributions
- Data mining approaches und virtual experiments using simulation models
- Accounting for climate change in design floods
Career:
Since 09/2024 Postdoc at GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Section 4.4 „Hydrology“
09/2020 – 09/2024 PhD student at GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Section 4.4 „Hydrology“
10/2019 – 02/2020 Student assistant, research group “Air Quality Modelling for Policy Advice”, Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies e.V. (IASS), Potsdam.
02/2018 – 09/2019 Student assistant, Institute for Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Potsdam.
01/2018 – 03/2020 Student assistant, area “Knowledge transfer into schools” in the School Lab, GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences.
06/2016 – 07/2016 Internship, Unit “Inherited pollution, soil conservation, groundwater quality”, State Office for the Environment Brandenburg (LfU).
09/2013 – 10/2013 Internship, Section “Climate Dynamics and Landscape Evolution”, GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences.
Education:
2020 – 2024 Doctoral studies, GFZ and University of Potsdam, Doctoral thesis: „When extreme floods are not as rare as they seem: controls of heavy-tailed flood peak distributions”, Degree: Dr. rer. nat.
2017 – 2020 Master study in Geoecology, University of Potsdam, Thesis: „European Urban Air Quality: A Comparison of Long-term Trends in Observations and Emission Inventories of NOx”, Degree: M.Sc. Geoecology2013 – 2017 Bachelor study in Geoecology, University of Potsdam, Thesis: „Stable Isotopes in Precipitation: Modelling Intra-Event Variations using Meteorological Parameters”, Degree: B.Sc. Geoecology
09/2015 – 05/2016 Semesters abroad via an Erasmus+ scholarship, University College Cork, Ireland
Projects:
SPATE Space-Time Dynamics of Extreme Floods, Subproject SP3: From small to extreme floods
JCAR ATRACE Joint Cooperation programme for Applied scientific Research on flood and drought risk management in regional river basins