Wanted: Postdoc researcher (1 year; focus on ferns — your choice of ecology, systematics or biogeography)

The project “How did Amazonia become so species rich? Answers from ferns” seeks a post doctoral researcher for one year (12 months) at the University of Turku (Department of Biology). The project is funded by the Turku University Foundation.

The overall aim of the project is to increase understanding on the high species diversity of tropical rain forests, especially what evolutionary processes have generated their enormous diversity, how it is maintained and what historical and environmental factors affect species distributions today.

The postdoctoral researcher is expected to actively pursue research that contributes to these aims. Possible research lines include fern systematics, community ecology, niche modelling and species distribution modelling. The exact topic will be agreed on according to the interests and qualifications of the successful candidate. The work will be done in collaboration with Hanna Tuomisto, Samuli Lehtonen and others.

This is an ideal position for a recent PhD graduate who needs to boost their CV: there are lots of cool research ideas and plenty of data to play with, so all you need to do is pick a topic and start writing papers. You will have access to a large dataset that has already been collected by the Amazon Research Team of the University of Turku: georeferenced records of fern community composition and environmental data, a comprehensive reference collection of voucher specimens and plenty of DNA sequences.

Starting date is negotiable but should be in autumn 2022. The funding consists of a personal grant of 2,039 €/month (minus standard social security costs).

To apply, please provide the following information:

1. Motivation letter: explain which aspects of the project you are most interested in and what qualifications you have for working on them
2. Preliminary research plan: choose a topic you would like to work on and provide an outline of how you would address the relevant research questions (maximum 3 pages)
3. CV and list of publications
4. Name and contact information of two academic referees

Send your application as a single pdf file to <hanna.tuomisto@utu.fi> with the words “Amazon fern postdoc” in the subject line. Evaluation of applications starts on the 1st of August, 2022, and continues until a suitable candidate has been found. If you have questions, feel free to contact Hanna Tuomisto.