PhD Studentship in Tropical Ecology

Experimentation with ecological succession in a Papua New Guinean rainforest: 

We are looking for an enthusiastic candidate to join a project exploring plant-insect food webs in tropical rainforests in Papua New Guinea, using manipulative experiments with entire communities. A successful candidate has

• a MSc degree (non-negotiable requirement for the PhD programme)
• serious interest in the ecology of insects and/or plants
• developed skills in [i] community ecology of insects or plants, or [ii] phylogenetic analysis, or [iii] plant chemistry analysis, or [iv] biostatistics
• fluency in spoken and written English
• ability to work independently and manage small teams in a tropical country

The successful applicant will join the Ecology Department at the Biology Center of the Czech Academy of Science (web ) and the Zoology Department of the University of South Bohemia (web ). The candidate will live in Ceske Budejovice (Czech Republic) (web ) and conduct field work at the New Guinea Binatang Research Center (web ). The PhD study will be supervised by Vojtech Novotny (web ). Our Department is a diverse team (11 nationalities) studying ecology, evolution and biogeography, and a world-class centre for food web research with regular publications in Science, Nature and other leading journals. Both the Czech Republic and Papua New Guinea are easy-going countries where life is interesting.

The deadline for applications is May 10th 2022, with a start date of September 1st 2022 (negotiable). The student will receive a scholarship fully covering living expenses in the Czech Republic for the 4-year PhD course. Applicants from all countries are eligible.To apply please send a CV, contact details for three references, electronic copy of your MSc thesis, and cover letter stating qualifications, previous work and motivation to Vojtech Novotny ([email protected] ) where you can also send any queries.