GRADUATE ASSISTANTSHIPS IN EXTINCTION AND FOREST FRAGMENTATION
We are seeking two graduate students to study extinction in beetle
communities in an NSF funded, large-scale forest fragmentation experiment in
south eastern Australia. We seek creative, motivated students with research
experience in ecology. We are particularly interested in students with 1)
taxonomic skills, or 2) quantitative skills (data analysis, modeling, large
data set skills), or a strong desire to develop these skills. Students will
develop an independent research program in collaboration with Dr Kendi
Davies and Dr Brett Melbourne, and will contribute to running the experiment
and handling specimens. Students will be supported through research
assistantships.
http://www.colorado.edu/eeb/EEBprojects/DaviesLab/index.html
http://www.colorado.edu/eeb/faculty/fac_melbourne.html
Please provide a brief description of your research interests, your CV, GRE
scores and your GPA to Dr Kendi Davies ([email protected]) by
December 31. Prospective students must ALSO apply to the graduate program of
the department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Colorado
by DEC 31 (http://www.colorado.edu/eeb/graduateprogram.html).
Summary:
Frequently, large-scale experimental studies have documented the decline of
species towards extinction immediately following fragmentation but have not
gone beyond these short-term, potentially transient dynamics to determine
the fate of declining species in the longer term. How many species that
initially decline eventually go extinct? Do other species that do not
respond to the initial perturbation go extinct in the long term? The
research will answer these questions in the Wog Wog fragmentation experiment
(Australia), the longest running large scale fragmentation experiment in
temperate forest. Existing short term data from the experiment will be used
together with a matching series of new data collected after long term
fragmentation to determine whether the transient dynamics of beetle species
through 5 years post experimental fragmentation, and trait of species
predict their fates in the long term, 23-25 years post fragmentation.
