PhD Opportunity in Palaeobiology
We offer a PhD position for a motivated and creative PhD candidate who wants to work at the forefront of palaeobiology integrating fossil data analyses and modelling approaches. The position is available from March 2018 for three years with salary defined according to the German E13/2 TV-L scale.
The PhD candidate will be fully integrated in the successful and vivid research team of the Section Palaeontology at the GeoZentrum Nordbayern. Research in the sections aims at understanding global change dynamics and the evolution of ecosystems on long temporal scales. We combine modern analytical methods and statistical analyses using large databases of ancient life. We have several ongoing projects on global diversity dynamics, macroevolutionary patterns and biotic consequences of temperature-related stresses and are among the main contributors and users of global biodiversity databases. The candidate will benefit from informal seminars, annual workshops and international summer schools of the Research Unit TERSANE (Temperature -related stresses as a unifying principle in ancient extinctions) that is hosted at the institution.
We welcome a new PhD candidate with general interests in marine palaeobiology who is open to develop his/her project interacting with us. A possible research topic might relate to exploring intrinsic limits of diversification and/or the stability of macroecological patterns through deep time. Own project ideas are welcome. Applicants should hold a M.Sc. in palaeobiology or a related field. The successful candidate should have scientific writing skills and knowledge of advanced statistical methods and programming in R. Experience in analyses and mining of large fossil databases is required. Furthermore, the successful candidate has a strong interest and ability to work both independently and in our team. We explicitly welcome applications from abroad. There are no requirements of German language skills.
For further information on the group visit our homepage or contact Prof. Dr. Manuel Steinbauer (manuel.steinbauer@fau.de) who will also receive your application in electronic form (including curriculum vitae, motivation/research statement, copy of selected publication/thesis). Please merge all documents into a single PDF, and include your name in the file name.