U.S. Geological Survey Mendenhall Postdoctoral Research Fellowship
We are currently accepting applications for USGS Mendenhall
Postdoctoral Program Opportunity 14-22: Integrating habitat modeling
and landscape genetics to understand impacts of climate change and
energy development on species persistence and diversity in the desert
southwest. The USGS Mendenhall Program provides an opportunity for
recent PhD graduates (within five years since completion of the
doctoral degree) to conduct concentrated research in association with
selected members of the USGS professional staff.
The overarching goal of our research program is to assess climate and
land use impacts to intraspecific genetic diversity and biodiversity,
and to develop science-based tools to inform decision-making in the
desert southwest. We encourage applicants with strong skills in
landscape genetics, landscape ecology, geospatial statistics, or
species distribution modeling to develop proposals to apply
innovative approaches to address potential impacts of climate and
land use change on habitat suitability and genetic structure across
species ranges in the desert Southwest. Applicants may propose
research centered on a number of themes including: 1) spatially
explicit modeling of population processes to predict changes to
patterns of presence and genetic diversity in target species under
different land use and climate scenarios; 2) developing novel methods
to model species distributions under climate change and assess the
significance of changes, and 3) empirical hypothesis testing to
understand environmental correlates and other landscape factors
associated with high neutral and/or adaptive variation within select
species. Significant data have been amassed to support these research
themes including species occurrence data, and genetic data for
several herpetofauna, small mammals and invertebrate species
throughout the study region, and derivatives of downscaled Global
Climate Models (e.g. climate water deficit and others), and over 70
environmental data layers rasterized at the relevant spatial scales.
Other resources include laboratory facilities and next generation
sequencing capabilities, GIS and computing resources.
Mendenhall Fellowships are 2-year appointments with competitive
salary and benefits. Fellows are typically granted project expense
funds appropriate to the scope of research to be conducted.
Opportunities will be open for application through September 20,
2013. Applicants are strongly encouraged to contact the research
advisors before developing a research proposal. More information
about the Mendenhall Program and this opportunity can be found at
<http://geology.usgs.gov/postdoc/>http://geology.usgs.gov/postdoc/
and
<http://geology.usgs.gov/postdoc/opps/2014/14-22%20Vandergast.htm>http://geology.usgs.gov/postdoc/opps/2014/14-22%20Vandergast.htm
Research Advisors: Amy Vandergast, (619) 225-6445,
<mailto:[email protected]>[email protected]; Kenneth Nussear,
(702) 564-4515, <mailto:[email protected]>[email protected]; Todd
Esque (702) 564-4506, <mailto:[email protected]>[email protected]
Proposed Duty Stations: San Diego, CA; Las Vegas, NV
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Amy Vandergast, Research Geneticist
USGS, Western Ecological Research Center
San Diego Field Station
4165 Spruance Road, Suite 200
San Diego CA, 92101
Phone: (619) 225-6445
Fax: (619) 225-6436
Email:
<https://mail.google.com/mail/?view=cm&fs=1&tf=1&[email protected]>[email protected]
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