Postdoc in avian biodiversity (Sweden)

Apply by: 2018-05-15

Project description
Birds are one of the most charismatic and well-studied group of animals,
yet we know very little about how humans have affected their global
patterns of diversity and evolutionary history. This project is part of
a larger initiative funded by the Swedish Research Council titled “Is
biodiversity understandable from contemporary distributions?” with
Søren Faurby (goo.gl/9S6nuP) as a PI and Tim Blackburn (goo.gl/9LWXfk;
a bird macro-ecologist at University College London) and Manuel
Steinbauer (goo.gl/UEiG7T; an island biologist at Friedrich-Alexander
University Erlangen-Nürnberg) as co-applicants. The work will involve
close collaboration with this team as well as additional researchers
at Gothenburg University, especially members of the Antonelli Lab
(http://antonelli-lab.net/).

Earlier work by the PI has discovered substantial biases
in macro-scale analyses of mammals, when conclusions
are drawn based only on present-day distributions
(e.g. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ddi.12369/full;
http://www.pnas.org/content/113/4/868.short;
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ecog.02287/abstract). The goal
of this project is to investigate whether those biases are restricted to
mammals (which could be particularly sensitive to anthropogenic impacts),
or are more general and affect other organisms.


Job assignments
Retrieving and analyzing information on the taxonomy of extinct birds

Estimating and analysing potential present-natural distribution of all
bird species and the differences between these and contemporary patterns

Employment
The employment is a full-time position for 18 months. The physical
placement will be at the University of Gothenburg, Department of
Biological and EnvironmentalScience but may include shorter stays
at University College London or Friedrich-Alexander University
Erlangen-Nürnberg.


Full details can be found at
https://www.gu.se/english/about_the_university/job-opportunities/vacancies-details/?id=2001




-
Søren Faurby
http://antonelli-lab.net