Multi-taxa responses of tropical insects to climate changes and anomalies on Barro Colorado Island in Panama

A PhD Studentship is available to work on Multi-taxa responses of tropical insects to climate changes and anomalies on Barro Colorado Island in Panama

A highly motivated postgraduate student is sought to join a project exploring how climate changes and anomalies affect arthropod species composition, structure, and the inherent disruption in trophic interactions in megadiverse tropical forests. Climate changes are amongst the major causes of global biodiversity with increasing impacts on ecosystems. Understanding how this biodiversity will respond to climate changes and extreme events is therefore crucial. However, we still have little knowledge of the impact of climate change on the largest share of terrestrial biodiversity, rainforest arthropods. Tropical arthropods and especially herbivores are particularly sensitive to desiccation and hence to drought or rainfall. The low seasonality and the projected air temperatures in the tropics regions is thought to generate insect populations with narrower thermal limits over which muscular coordination is lost or disrupted. The student will implement and conduct a large experimentation on BCI Island to evaluate the thermal tolerance of functionally important Lepidoptera species and experimentally measure the Critical Thermal Minimum and Maximum tolerance, i.e. the temperature at which motor function stops and coordination is lost in invertebrates – on focal species that our project have been monitoring for one decade (see https://forestgeo.si.edu/research-programs/arthropod-initiative). The student will also conduct field surveys part of the ongoing arthropod monitoring on BCI on the same target taxa (butterfly and moth). She/he will participate to the analytical framework proposed by the project and the compilation of the trait-based matrix on functional and physiological traits. Finally, there will also be opportunities to develop the project in a direction of the student’s own choosing.

Duties will include spending extensive periods of time in the field in Panama (https://stri.si.edu/facility/barro-colorado). The successful applicant will join the Biodiversity and Climate Change Research Group at the Institute of Entomology, Biology Centre Academy of Sciences, Ceske Budejovice, Czech Republic, under the supervision of Greg Lamarre (https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Greg_Lamarre), Yves Basset (https://stri.si.edu/scientist/yves-basset) and Vojtech Novotny (https://www.plantanimalinteractions.com/). The laboratory is a new dynamic, multinational group studying arthropod ecology, functional ecology and climate changes (among other things), and is embedded within the Department of Ecology, a world-class centre for interaction network research with regular publications in Science, Nature and other leading journals.

The deadline for applications is February 1st, 2019, with a start date of March, 1st 2019. The student will receive a scholarship from the University of South Bohemia and employment on an ongoing grant for the 4-year PhD course, sufficient to cover living expenses in Czech Republic. Applicants from all countries are eligible.

Required
• A master’s degree (non-negotiable requirement for PhD study in Czech Republic).
• Interest in the ecology of insects.
• 1st or upper second (2.1) undergraduate degree in ecology or related subject (or equivalent).
• Enthusiasm for working in the field for extended periods of time in challenging conditions in tropical rain forest.
• Ability to work independently and manage small teams of assistants.
• Fluency in spoken and written English (Spanish is optional but recommended)
• Experience in the use of ecological statistical analyses.

Desirable
• Previous experience of tropical field work.
• Research experience with insect taxonomy, morphological traits and/or insect physiology.
• Experience with basic ecological molecular lab work relating to use for species identification
• Experience with scientific publishing in the above field

To apply please send a CV, contact details for three references, and cover letter stating qualifications, previous work and motivation to Greg Lamarre ([Email Address Removed]) and Yves Basset ([Email Address Removed]). Please also feel free to get in touch to discuss the project further.