M.S. Assistantship in small mammal metacommunity
ecology at Texas State University San Marcos.
I am currently accepting one graduate student
interested in metacommunity ecology of small
mammals. Applicants should be independent and
highly motivated. Quantitative skills (or the
desire to hone these) are highly preferred. The
work will involve extracting information from
large databases and previously published data to
conduct comparative analyses about the structure
of small mammal metacommunities. The research
will not involve fieldwork but opportunities for
participation in fieldwork activities will exist
to complement the training of the potential
graduate student. Current research in my lab
examines the relationship between rodent
community patterns and prevalence of disease
agents (i.e., Hantavirus, Borrelia, Trypanosoma)
in reservoir species and how this changes along
environmental and disturbance gradients. The
ultimate goal is to generate models of predictive
value of Emergent Infectious Diseases outbreaks
and a main question imbedded within is to
determine the role of small mammal diversity and
community composition as a factor of disease
spread. The metacommunity study will be part of
this overall effort and ultimately the research
will be integrated into questions pertaining to disease ecology.
The Biology Department
(<http://www.bio.txstate.edu/>http://www.bio.txstate.edu/)
of Texas State University San Marcos
(<http://www.txstate.edu/>http://www.txstate.edu/)
has a M.S. program in wildlife ecology with an
emphasis on the application of ecological
principles to studies in wildlife ecology and
natural resource management. The main campus is
conveniently located in central Texas along the
I-35 corridor and close to both Austin and San
Antonio. Details about the entry requirements for
this graduate program can be found here
(<http://www.gradcollege.txstate.edu/>http://www.gradcollege.txstate.edu/and
<http://www.bio.txstate.edu/graduate.html>http://www.bio.txstate.edu/graduate.html).
Student salary will be through either grant
support or as an instructional assistantship (TA), or a combination of both.
Applicants need to meet the entrance requirement
for the program, department and university. The
proposed start date is for Fall 2013 (university
application deadline is June 15) but if no
suitable student is found then the start date
would be for spring 2014. For more details about
this opportunity you can visit my website
(http://txstate.academia.edu/IvanCastroArellano)
where I have a description of my research and
past publications. Interested individuals should
email me, Ivan Castro-Arellano, to
ic13(at)txstate.edu with the subject line:
Prospective Student. Please attach a single pdf
document that includes a brief description of
your research interests and why you would like to
join the lab, a CV (including GPA and GRE
scores), a scanned copy of your transcript, and
contact information for two references.
