JOB: Assistant Professor in Environmental Chemistry

June 21, 2019
WDG

Assistant Professor (tenure track) in Environmental Chemistry
Institute for Biodiversity & Ecosystem Dynamics (IBED)
University of Amsterdam
Deadline: 3 july 2019

IBED is looking for an environmental chemist/environmental scientist experienced in studying sources, transport, transformation and degradation and fate of chemicals in ecosystems to support ongoing work within the Department of Ecosystem & Landscape Dynamics (ELD), and create links with the Department of Freshwater & Marine Ecology. We are particularly looking for a researcher with an international track record with expertise in one, or more, of the following areas:

  • The fate and effects of organic contaminants of emerging concern in the environment.
  • The mitigation of environmental pollution.
  • Environmental policy and circular economy.
  • Regional and larger-scale systems analysis of human impacts on the environment.​

This is one of two positions currently open in Earth Systems Science within ELD. The other position is related to Soil Carbon Cycling and we will be looking at complimentary between the two appointments.

For further details and information on how to apply click here.

Contact: Annemarie van Wezel (IBED Director) or William D. Gosling (Head of ELD)

JOB: Post-doctoral researcher in Global Ecology

June 7, 2019
WDG

Post-doctoral researcher in Global Ecology
Institute for Biodiversity & Ecosystem Dynamics (IBED)
University of Amsterdam
Deadline: 14 july 2019

There is a 18 month post-doctoral research position within the Department of Theoretical & Computational Ecology at IBED focused on Global Ecology, we are looking for someone with skills and experience the following areas:

  • PhD in ecology, biodiversity or a related discipline
  • quantitative skills and statistical analyses
  • species distribution modelling
  • analyses of species composition, functional traits and species interactions

For further details and how to apply click here, or contact Daniel Kissling

Vegetation responses to late Holocene climate changes in an Andean forest

May 31, 2019
Candurill

Vegetation responses to late Holocene climate changes in an Andean forest
By Klaas Land (currently studying MSc Biological Sciences (Ecology & Evolution) at the University of Amsterdam.

The discussion during the APC meeting on the 19th of March was on the paper by Schiferl et al. (2018), a very recent study on the climatic shifts in the late Holocene and their effects on the South American tropics. The study had analysed a core going back about 3800 years from Lake Palotoa, which was in the Andean foothills (1370m elevation). They found that subtle changes to the fossil pollen record could be identified around the estimated periods for the Little Ice Age (LIA) and Medieval Climate Anomaly (MCA). The focus in the paper Continue Reading

Looking at a time capsule from Twente

May 29, 2019
WDG

Dobrochna wondering what kind
of pollen and phytoliths are hidden
it that piece of dirt (Krakenven, 2018)

Looking at a time capsule from Twente

By Dobrochna Delsen (currently studying for BSc Biology at the University of Amsterdam)

An unusual early morning.

It is 8:15. My train arrives at Science Park. After a ten-minute walk accompanied by other students I arrive at the university. After a short contemplation about whether I should take the elevator, I decide to take the stairs. The stairs are a bit exhausting, especially since the microscope room is at the top floor, but it gives me the necessary ‘exercise’ for the day. As I walk to the room at the end of the corridor I can see that the coat rack is still empty, except of the one lab coat that hangs there since the day my bachelors project started. I take out my student card and hold it against the door handle. The sound of the unlocking door gives me feeling of satisfaction and power. I step into the empty room with a feeling of superiority and go to my microscope where I will sit for the rest of the day.

Continue Reading

Cloudy with a chance of adventure

April 8, 2019
WDG

Rachel Sales, Bryan Valencia, and Majoi de Novaes Nascimento coring a different lake. In this picture, we have just pulled a core of mud up from the bottom of the lake. Photo credit: Seringe Huisman

Rachel Sales, Bryan Valencia, and Majoi de Novaes Nascimento coring a different lake. In this picture, we have just pulled a core of mud up from the bottom of the lake. Photo credit: Seringe Huisman

Cloudy with a chance of adventure
By Rachel Sales (PhD researcher at the Institute for Global Ecology, Florida Institute of Technology)

I am sitting on the shore of Lago Condorcillo in Southern Ecuador, after a long day of travel, trying to control my shivering. At roughly 10,500 ft. above sea level, the lake is very cold, with wind that howls over the barren hills dotted with giant boulders. The lake is also almost always blanketed by thick fog and pelted by driving rain. When you’re surrounded by the thick fog punctuated by lightning bolts, it’s easy to believe that some lost civilization lurks just out of sight. Tonight we are experiencing lightning storms, which is adding to the feeling that some angry, ancient life form must live at Lago Condorcillo.

Tomorrow, I will be out in the cold and rain, balancing on an inflatable boat and fighting frostbite. Mark Bush, who is my Ph.D. advisor, Courtney Shadik, who is my lab partner and tent buddy, and I will be collecting cores of mud from the bottom of Condorcillo. We will create our rig for coring by tying two inflatable boats together, and placing a wooden platform between them. Mark, Courtney, and I will then collect our mud cores from this platform.

As I’m contemplating the hazards of camping in a lightning storm, Mark says, “Tell me everything that went wrong today.” Courtney pulls a sleeping bag closer to her. I begin to describe how Google Maps can’t seem to understand distance in the Andes, and so traveling to Lago Condorcillo took much longer than we anticipated. Courtney laughs beside me and adds, “We don’t have any matches to start a fire.” Despite our troubles, I am grinning from ear to ear, no doubt spoiling the grim mood Mark is attempting to cultivate and Lago Condorcillo is doing its best to enforce.

Continue Reading

Get involved with the British Ecological Society

March 18, 2019
WDG

We are currently looking for a new representative to join the British Ecological Society (BES) Education and Careers Committee (ECC) of which I am currently the chair. I have been involved with the BES for may years first attending a conference in 2000 (Warwick University), running the Tropical Ecology special interest group (2006-2009), as an ordinary member of council (2010-2014), and chairing the ECC (2014-2020). Throughout my envolvement with the BES I have had positive experiences and enjoyed contributing to a society that can get things done. Since I have been involved with ECC we have launced under-graduate and A-level summer schools, introduced a mentoring scheme for acadmices, and helped to encourage academics to engage the public with science. If you are interested in helping us to develop the activity of the society please consider joining us!

For full details visit the advert on the BES web page by clicking here.
Closing date: 22 March 2019

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Palynologische Kring: Spatial patterns in palaeoecology

March 18, 2019
WDG

Palynologische Kring: Spatial patterns in palaeoecology meeting
Date: Thursday 4 April
Location: Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed (RCE), Amersfoort

  • 13:30 – 14:00 Otto Brinkkemper (RCE): Spatial patterns in the Dutch archaeobotanical dataset
  • 14:00 – 14:30 Marjolein Gouw-Bouman (Utrecht University): Spatial patterns of the Dark Age reforestation

Break

  • 15:00 – 15:30 Thomas Giesecke (Utrecht University): Research and education of vegetation change in four dimensions – developments of the European Pollen Database in Neotoma
  • 15:30 – 16:00 Crystal McMichael (University of Amsterdam): Ancient human disturbances may be skewing our understanding of Amazonian ecology

Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed

Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed

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Plant Ecology & Diversity

February 22, 2019
WDG

I recently joined the editorial board of Plant Ecology & Diversity at the invitation of editor-in-chief Laszlo Nagy (University of  Campinas, Brazil). The journal focuses on ecological and evolutionary issues within plant biology with broad themes covering biodiversity, conservation and global change. Furthermore, I think this is a particularly interesting journal to be involved with because of its option for double-blind peer reviews, commitment to providing a platform for ‘negative results’ and ‘repeat experiments’, and its open access Grubb Review series (Nagy & Resco de Dios, 2016); which already includes many significant articles, including: Ashton (2017), Barbeta & Peñuelas (2016), Grubb (2016), Körner (2018), Valladares et al. (2016), and Wilkinson & Sherratt (2016). In addition to the invited Grubb Reviews the journal publishes: research articles, short communications, reviews, and scientific correspondence. My role on the editorial board will be to cover submissions related to tropical palaeoecology and biogeography. So please consider submitting to Plant Ecology & Diversity if you have some exciting new research or ideas that you think would be appropriate.

 

References Continue Reading

TERRA NOVA project – 15 PhD positions avaliable!

February 20, 2019
WDG

Posted on behalf of Sjoerd Kluiving Coordinator TERRANOVA

“TERRA NOVA is a new Research Fellowship Programme funded by the European Commission that learns from landscapes with past energy regimes to design new landscapes in the low carbon society. Are you interested in TERRA NOVA and you feel qualified to apply, take a look at one of the 15 positions that are available, and apply before – April 15th 2019.”

To visit the TERRANOVA websitde click here.

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