PhD Studentship, Mathematical Ecology - Population Dynamics and Environmental Change. University of Exeter, Cornwall Campus, UK
Primary supervisor: Professor Stuart Townley (email s.b.town...@ex.ac.uk) Start date: 1st October 2012. Species evolve. Species invade. Species go extinct. Such biological phenomena have fascinated mathematicians and statisticians for over a century, yielding todays state-of-the-art mathematical and statistical modelling and analysis tools including: Adaptive dynamics for evolution; invasion exponents for invasions; and meta-population analysis for extinction. But the environment is changing, with patterns of environmental disturbance becoming more intense and temporally and spatially clustered. The project will consider issues such as: How are life histories shaped by environmental disturbance? How do the fluctuating dynamics of one species, population or community act to mitigate, buffer, attenuate or amplify the effects of environmental disturbance on another? How can we untangle the relative importance of competing effects such as transients, diffusion, un-modelled dynamics and density dependence? The PhD project will be located in the University of Exeter Environment & Sustainability Institute, a £30 million centre leading cutting- edge and interdisciplinary research into solutions to problems of environmental change. Three-year studentship: Tuition fees (UK/EU) and an annual maintenance allowance at current UK Research Council rate. To apply see: http://www.exeter.ac.uk/studying/funding/award/?id=924 Deadline: 30th March 2012
