Beca para realizar tesis en ecología de ecosistemas costeros en Italia

A PhD fellowship is offered for a three year project to be developped at the Stazione Zoologica A. Dohrn of Naples, Italy, within the framework of the Joint Program with the Open University of London.

Director of Studies: Dr. Raffaella Casotti
Deadline for applications is Sept 3rd, 2012.

Any useful information and instructions can be found at www.szn.it or writing by email to raffaella.casotti@szn.it (tel. 0039.081.5833235)

Project title: Marine Microbes diversity and functioning in different ecological coastal ecosystems.

The aim of this research project is to further develop and improve the modern tools to study natural microbial communities in coastal areas. The project will use only direct analyses, bypassing the cultivation step, which is often biasing a realistic representation of the organisms present in nature. These include flow cytometry for direct counting, and molecular methods for the identification of groups or species (CARD-FISH). Metabolic activities will be assessed using Microautoradiography coupled with CARD-FISH. In this project we will use high throughput sequencing to study the composition of bacterial communities in various natural environments with great resolution. We are specifically interested in studying the effects of anthropogenic activity on the composition and activity of bacterial communities. In addition to this, we hope to make a contribution towards uncovering the principles that govern the interactions among microbes (who interacts with whom, how, when, where, and the consequences thereof) and that influence microbially mediated nutrient flow in the marine environment (who consumes and excretes what, where, how much, when, and the consequences thereof). This project will use a combination of laboratory experiments and field studies. The Gulf of Naples will be used as a reference point for other coastal areas, in order to find microbiological indicators of ecological status. We expect that the applicants have obtained an MSc degree in biology or marine ecology or similar, a good grasp of theoretical concepts, and some expertise in laboratory techniques used in molecular microbial ecology, DNA sequencing and bioinformatic analysis. Fluency in English is a requirement.

Useful references:

Balestra C., Alonso-Saez L., Gasol J. M., Casotti R. (2011) Group-specific effects on coastal bacterioplankton of polyunsaturated aldehydes produced by diatoms. Aquatic Microbial Ecology 63: 123-131.

Handelsman J (2004) Metagenomics: application of genomics to uncultured organims. Microbiology and Molecular Biology Reviews 68:669-685.

Pernthaler, A., J. Pernthaler and R. Amann (2002) Fluorescence in situ hibridization and catalyzed reporter deposition for the identification of marine bacteria. Applied and Environmental Microbiology 68: 3094-3101.

Rusch D, Halpern A, Sutton G, Heidelberg K, Williamson S, et al. (2005) The Sorcerer II Global Ocean Sampling Expedition: Nortwestern Atlantic through Eastern

Keywords:
Microbial ecology, metagenomics, marine bacteria, ecological status, single cell analysis