A Ph.D. position in molecular evolutionary biology is available in the lab of Axel Meyer in the Department of Biology at the University of Konstanz in Germany. The evolutionary biology group is an international group of students and postdocs that consists of about 20 people from 10 different countries. The language in the lab is
English.
We are looking for an energetic Ph.D. student who is interested in speciation, molecular evolution, bioinformatics/genomics, or evolutionary developmental biology. The specific research projects we are recruiting for involve (1) research on the patterns of relationships and population genetics of cichlid fishes (2) as well
as the discovery and functional characterization of (e.g. coloration) genes underlying the diversification of cichlids in Africa and in Nicaragua.
The great lakes in East Africa house some of the world's most diverse freshwater ecosystems. Lakes Victoria, Malawi and Tanganyika are particularly well-known for their adaptive radiations of hundreds of endemic species of cichlid fishes. We are interested in understanding speciation, phylogeography, molecular evolution and molecular phylogenetics of these cichlid fish assemblages. Also, we wish to
identify and characterize the function of genes that are involved in the phenotypic diversification and presumably speciation of cichlid fishes. Several molecular biological, "devo-evo" and genomic approaches, including candidate gene approaches, DNA-chip technology, characterization of ESTs, in situ hybridization in cichlids and
transgenics in zebrafish are used to address these questions. We are also interested in evolutionary genomic questions and the evolution of novel gene functions after gene and genome duplications.
Some recent publications of the lab include:
Verheyen et al. (2003). The origin of the superflock of cichlid fishes from Lake Victoria, East Africa. Science 300: 325-329.Salzburger et al. (2005). Out of Tanganyika: Genesis, explosive speciation, key-innovations and phylogeography of the haplochromine cichlid fishes. BMC Evolutionary Biology 5: 17.Barluenga et al. (2006). Sympatric speciation in Nicaraguan crater lake cichlid fish. Nature 439: 719-23 Braasch et al. (2006). Asymmetric evolution in two fish-specifically duplicated receptor tyrosine kinase paralogons involved in teleost coloration. Molecular Biology and Evolution 23:1192-1202.
Funding is available for at least 2 years. A Ph.D. thesis in Germany is supposed to be finished within about 3 years. Ph.D. salaries (50% BATII/a government pay scale) are approximately 20 to 25,000 Euros annually, (depending on marital status, age, etc.) before deductions for taxes, health insurance and retirement contributions.
The position is open immediately. The review and invitation of applicants will begin at the end of June 2006 and will continue until the position is filled. To apply, please email a curriculum vitae, including a list of publications, a statement of research interests, and the names and email addresses of two references to axel.meyer@uni-konstanz.de.
Prof. Axel Meyer, Ph.D.
Department of Biology
Konstanz University
78457 Konstanz, Germany
Email: axel.meyer@uni-konstanz.de
For more information visit http://www.evolutionsbiologie.uni-
konstanz.de/index.php?sectionfiltered=3D10
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