NERC (GW4+ DTP) PhD studentship on the

evolution of pollinator pathogens at the Cornwall

Campus of the University of Exeter, starting in
September 2016.

Pollinator plagues: the evolutionary ecology of

shared infectious diseases in pollinator
communities

Honeybees and bumblebees are key pollinators of

wild and agricultural flowering plants. Recently, it has
become clear that these insects not only overlap in
their ecology, but also share many infectious diseases
(Manley et al. 2015, Fuerst et al. 2014). This makes
pollinators an excellent ecological model system for
emerging diseases, but also potentially impacts how
pollinators have to be managed and conserved. In
this project, you will be able to study the ecological
and evolutionary risk factors driving disease
emergence and spread, as well as their impacts on
pollinator communities at an ecological and
evolutionary level. You will be part of a large
collaborative research project studying the impacts of
agri-environment schemes, designed to improve

agricultural landscapes for pollinators, on emerging

diseases in pollinators.

In this PhD, you will be trained in experimental

ecology in the field and the lab and gain skills in
molecular ecology, population genetics and
phylogenetics. With your PhD, you will be able to
address both fundamental questions on the
evolutionary ecology of multi-host pathogen
interactions, as well on the applied impacts of these
interactions and how they can be mitigated. You will
primarily based at the University of Exeter's Penryn
campus, but also spend time at NERC's Centre for
Ecology and Hydrology (CEH) in Oxfordshire. You will
be supervised by a team of experts in emerging
diseases and pollinator ecology at the University of
Exeter (Dr. Lena Wilfert, Prof. Juliet Osborne), CEH
(Dr. Claire Carvell) and Royal Holloway University
(Prof. Mark Brown). For informal enquiries, please
contact Dr. Lena Wilfert (lena.wilfert@ex.ac.uk).

Frst MA, McMahon DP, Osborne JL et al. (2014)

Disease associations between honeybees and
bumblebees as a threat to wild pollinators. Nature,
506, 364-366.

Manley R, Boots M, Wilfert L (2015) Emerging

viral disease risk to pollinating insects: ecological,
evolutionary and anthropogenic factors. Journal of
Applied Ecology, 52, 331-340.

Please click here for more details or to apply for

this competitive studentship:
http://www.exeter.ac.uk/studying/funding/award/?
id=1953

Entry requirements:
Applicants should have obtained, or be about to
obtain, a First orUpper Second Class UK Honours
degree, or the equivalent qualifications gained outside
the UK. Applicants with a Lower Second Class
degree will be considered if they also have Masters
degree. Applicants with a minimum Upper Second
Class degree and significant relevant nonacademic experience are encouraged to apply. All
applicants would need to meet our English language
requirements by the start of the
projecthttp://www.exeter.ac.uk/postgraduate/apply/en

glish/ The majority of the studentships are available

for applicants who are ordinarily resident in the UK
and are classed as UK/EU for tuition fee purposes,
however up to 9 fully funded studentships across the
DTP are available for EU/EEA applicants not
ordinarily resident in the UK. Applicants who are
classed as International for tuition fee purposes are
not eligible for funding.

Application deadline: 8th January 2016

Value: At least 14,057pa for 3.5 years and UK/EU
tuition fees for eligible students

Contact: CLES PGR Support Team 01392

723706/01392 725150
exeter-nerc-gw4+@exeter.ac.uk