molecular ecology PhD Projects, Programs & Scholarships

Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually the project which receives the best applicant will be successful. Unsuccessful projects may still go ahead as self-funded opportunities.

Project Highlights. Marine microbes meet omics. World-leading supervisory team on marine microbiology and ecology. Uniquely opportunity at Warwick to apply cutting-edge techniques on integrated omics.

PhD in Evolution and Behaviour: exploring the connection between how organisms have evolved and how they behave

University of Sheffield
Department of Animal and Plant Sciences

Dr C Voigt

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

The connection between how organisms have evolved and how they behave is a fundamental principle of biology. It can show us why organisms are the way they are, and answer deep questions about the diversity of life on earth.

Cave exploration: shedding light on organic sulfur cycling in a terrestrial underground chemosynthetic system

University of Warwick
School of Life Sciences

Research Group: CENTA - Central England NERC Training Alliance

Dr H Schaefer, Dr Y Chen, Dr D Kumaresan

Application Deadline: 29 May 2020

Funding Type

PhD Type

Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually the project which receives the best applicant will be successful. Unsuccessful projects may still go ahead as self-funded opportunities.

Project Highlights. Investigate the organic sulfur cycle of a closed cave ecosystem based on chemosynthesis. Apply stable isotope and metagenomics approaches to characterise uncultivated bacteria.

Conservation Genomics and Epigenomics of Fragmented and Declining Populations

Flinders University
College of Science and Engineering

Prof L Beheregaray

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

Funded PhD Project (Students Worldwide)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project has funding attached, subject to eligibility criteria. Applications for the project are welcome from all suitably qualified candidates, but its funding may be restricted to a limited set of nationalities. You should check the project and department details for more information.

We are looking for a bright candidate for one PhD position associated with the project. “The evolutionary potential of fragmented and declining populations”.

Microorganisms entombed in Polar ice – assessing the potential emergence of new diseases (Ref: SF20/APP/PEARCE1)

Northumbria University
Faculty of Health and Life Sciences

Prof D Pearce

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

The melting Polar Ice caps and receding glaciers worldwide are resulting in the emergence of microorganisms entombed in the ice for considerable periods of time.

Finding the right fungal friends: determining how plant defences against against insect herbivores are impacted by different mycorrhizal fungal communities.

University of Southern Queensland
School of Sciences

Dr A Frew

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

Competition Funded PhD Project (Students Worldwide)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually the project which receives the best applicant will be successful. Unsuccessful projects may still go ahead as self-funded opportunities. Applications for the project are welcome from all suitably qualified candidates, but potential funding may be restricted to a limited set of nationalities. You should check the project and department details for more information.

Background. Almost all plants on the planet are attacked by at least one, if not many, insect herbivores. Many of these insects have become pests of crops and they impact crop productivity.

Adapting methods from statistical ecology and applying them to molecular data in cancer

University of St Andrews
School of Mathematics and Statistics

Research Group: Division of Statistics

Prof A Lynch, Dr H Worthington

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

Competition Funded PhD Project (Students Worldwide)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually the project which receives the best applicant will be successful. Unsuccessful projects may still go ahead as self-funded opportunities. Applications for the project are welcome from all suitably qualified candidates, but potential funding may be restricted to a limited set of nationalities. You should check the project and department details for more information.

There are a number of questions that arise from proteomic and RNA studies in cancer that have clear parallels in the world of ecology.

Bovine TB: Reconstructing the molecular evolution of Mycobacterium bovis

Queen’s University Belfast
School of Biological Sciences

Prof P Prodohl, Dr R Hynes

Application Deadline: 29 May 2020

Funding Type

PhD Type

Funded PhD Project (Students Worldwide)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project has funding attached, subject to eligibility criteria. Applications for the project are welcome from all suitably qualified candidates, but its funding may be restricted to a limited set of nationalities. You should check the project and department details for more information.

Bovine tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious mycobacterial disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis var. bovis, a pathogenic member of the M.

Point-of-care diagnosis of opportunistic fungal infections using innovative molecular biosensors.

Royal Holloway, University of London
School of Biological Sciences

Dr J Tovar

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Human fungal infections have emerged as one of the most pressing global health problems in recent years.

Accelerating molecular phylogenetic inference using high performance computing.

University of Reading
School of Biological Sciences

Dr A Meade

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Molecular phylogenetic inference, constructing evolutionary histories from molecular data, is an activity universal to all biological disciplines.

PhD Scholarship in Neuroecology - Investigating the neural bases of animal behaviour in the context of its habitat and ecology.

La Trobe University
Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Microbiology

Prof S P Collin

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

Funded PhD Project (Students Worldwide)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project has funding attached, subject to eligibility criteria. Applications for the project are welcome from all suitably qualified candidates, but its funding may be restricted to a limited set of nationalities. You should check the project and department details for more information.

Our Research Laboratory lies at the intersection of two major fields of biology (Neurobiology. the study of the nervous system, and Ecology.

University of Sheffield
Department of Animal and Plant Sciences

PhD in Chemical Ecology

Dr S Campbell

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

In response to the near-universal threat of being consumed by insect herbivores, plants have evolved a sophisticated arsenal of chemical defences.

PhD in the Evolutionary Ecology of Mating Systems

University of Sheffield
Department of Animal and Plant Sciences

Dr S Campbell

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Mating and breeding systems govern a wide range of evolutionary processes in plants and animals, including gene flow, genetic variation, and the strength of natural selection.

Dissecting the molecular mechanisms of antibiotic resistance in bacterial pathogens

University of Leeds
Faculty of Biological Sciences

Research Group: Astbury Centre for Structural Molecular Biology

Dr A O'Neill

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Antibiotics make possible the treatment and cure of life-threatening bacterial infections. Since their introduction in the middle years of the 20th Century, they have added ~10 years to the human lifespan, and have become a cornerstone of modern medicine.

Ecology of Insect Pests of Stored Products and Museums

University of Reading
School of Biological Sciences

Dr G J Holloway

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Man stores many different products for a variety of purposes. Stored products include food, wood, clothing and also items in museums stored for posterity.