"The use of energy is universal to all life forms and all levels of biological organization, potentially linking processes operating at variable scales." (link)
"Camouflage is a widespread anti-predator adaptation that hinders detection or recognition by increasing prey resemblance to natural environment or objects therein..." (link)
"Anthropogenic stressors, such as radioactive contaminants released from the Chernobyl and Fukushima Daiichi accidents, deteriorate ecological and evolutionary processes..." (link)
Contact for motivated students willing to pursue interesting questions: boratyns@gmail.com
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Field work in Morocco, Lower Drâa (August 2023)
Deployment of environmental loggers and measurements of metabolic rate on rodents
Welcome Tiago Macedo in the team!
Tiago Afonso Macedo received doctoral Scholarship from Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) for conducting research on evolutionary ecology of adaptation in extreme environments. Tiagos work will include experiments and investigation of camouflage in Sahara-Sahel rodents. He is interested in scale of adaptive responses and influence of environmental variation on it.
Welcome dr. Alexandra M. Tyers in the team!
Dr. Tyres is interested in mechanisms of speciation, previously worked on speciation in African cichlids. She received position at BIOPOLIS, University of Porto, to investigate evolution of pre- and post-zygotic mechanisms of reproductive isolation in speciose desert rodents.
Post-doctoral / PhD studentship opportunity
Title: Phylogenomics and evolution of speciose desert rodents (genera: Gerbillus)
We are looking for an enthusiastic student / junior researcher to join project and expeditions to the Sahara to collect data and accomplish research / PhD thesis. The selected candidate will apply with the team for an independent research position / PhD scholarship. Several financing opportunities exist within the supervisor team institutions (more details here).
Application:
Send (1) a short letter of interest (1 page), (2) CV (1-3 pages) and (3) list of publications (all integrated in one pdf file) to: boratyns@cibio.up.pt
Relevant references:
Bryja et al. 2022. Rodents of the Afar Triangle (Ethiopia): geographical isolation causes high level of endemism. Biodivers Conserv, 10.1007/s10531-022-02354-4
Boratyński et al. 2017. Repeated evolution of camouflage in speciose desert rodents. Sci Rep, 10.1038/s41598-017-03444-y
Ndiaye et al. 2016. Evolutionary systematics and biogeography of the arid habitat‐adapted rodent genus Gerbillus (Rodentia, Muridae): a mostly Plio‐Pleistocene African history. J Zoolog Syst Evol, 10.1111/jzs.12143
Ndiaye et al. 2016. Taxonomic hypotheses regarding the genus Gerbillus (Rodentia, Muridae, Gerbillinae) based on molecular analyses of museum specimens. ZooKeys, 10.3897/zookeys.566.7317
Field work in Southern Morocco (October-November 2021)
TV news about the team collaboration in Lower Drâa region
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Welcome Nelish Pradhan in the team!
Nelish started his post-doc within the project investigating desert adaptations on genomic level. He did PhD at the University of Vermont. He is interested in taxonomy and evolutionary processes, population genetics, molecular ecology and systematics, and biogeography of small mammals of Eurasia and Africa.
Field work in Morocco-Mauritania (December 2019-January 2020)
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Field work in Afroalpine, Guassa, Ethiopia (November 2019)
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Short field work in Ethiopia, Afar (September 2019)
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Master thesis opportunity
This project will test hypotheses linking selected behaviors and energetics of mobility. Work will be performed on subterranean Spalax rodents in laboratory in the Czech Republic (University of South Bohemia, České Budějovice). Student will be given opportunity to participate in field mission.
Relevant references:
Kraus et al. 2022. Bite force in the strictly subterranean rodent family of African mole‐rats (Bathyergidae): the role of digging mode, social organisation, and ecology. Func Ecol 10.1111/1365-2435.14132
Lövy et al. 2020. Presumed ecological speciation in blind mole rats: does soil type influence mate preferences? Ethol Ecol Evol 10.1080/03949370.2019.1646809
Jiao et al. 2021. Local adaptation of bitter taste and ecological speciation in a wild mammal. Mol Biol Evol 10.1093/molbev/msab205
Enriquez-Urzelai U, Boratyński Z. 2022. Energetic dissociation of individual and species ranges. Biol Lett 10.1098/rsbl.2021.0374
Contacts:
Matěj Lövy, University of South Bohemia, České Budějovice (mates.lovy@mail.com)
Zbyszek Boratyński. BIOPOLIS, CIBIO-InBIO (boratyns@cibio.up.pt)
Collaboration opportunity within desert mammals
E.g. we can support independent applications for Junior Researcher position within the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (https://www.fct.pt/: Calls/Scientific Employment: 1. Scientific Employment Stimulus - Individual Call) or PhD position from the same foundation. The usual timelines are: January-April (but make a contact well in advance).
We work mainly, but not only, on Sahara-Sahel rodents as a suitable model system to investigate variable aspects of animal adaptations (e.g.: https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.). We develop an integrative approaches to study organisms struggle in extreme conditions (combining fields such as: ecophysiology, behavioral and community ecology, genomics, remote sensing). Our students and collaborators are provided opportunity to join ongoing investigations and field work, of research integrating multiple fields. We are flexible concerning detailed aspects of collaboration.