Arculus joined ANU as a full professor in 1994.[6] He successfully campaigned for Australia to join the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program and subsequently participated in a number of research voyages on board the RV Franklin and RV Southern Surveyor.[2] He returned to Durham in October 2009, where he was a fellow at the Institute of Advanced Study through December.[5] In 2017 he argued that volcanic eruptions could take place in Melbourne or Auckland and suggested that volcanic eruptions may have contributed to the outbreak of war in ancient Egypt.[7]