Research projects

IPhD self-funded projects (November-April)

Our Integrated PhD combines an MSc and PhD project in a 1+3+1 format.
You can select from the below projects and indentify your chosen MSc from the options listed on the project.

Please note that you can apply for the below PhD projects outwith the IPhD route.

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Novel approaches to understand the relationship between environmental change and biodiversity in space and time

Supervisors: Davide Dominoni, Sofie Spatharis, Jason Matthiopoulos, Rebecca Mancy

MSc choices: Animal Welfare Science, Ethics & Law [MSc], Ecology & Environmental Biology [MRes], Quantitative Methods in Biodiversity, Conservation & Epidemiology [MSc]

Outline: Preventing the irreversible loss of biodiversity while supporting human livelihoods is one of the greatest contemporary challenges. Anthropogenic changes, such as agricultural intensification, urbanisation and climate warming, are recognised as a major driving force of species extinctions, threatening up to 85% of all species included in the IUCN's Red List. Our current understanding of the relationship between anthropogenic habitat change and biodiversity change is often constrained by spatially and temporally limited datasets. Moreover, temporal delays in the response of biodiversity to environmental change are often neglected when defining environmental policies such as setting biodiversity targets.

This project will aim to construct spatial models of biodiversity, explicitly accounting for the temporal structure of the data, to assess the relationship between environmental variables and species abundance/diversity. This will allow us to quantify the temporal delays in the response of populations and biodiversity to environmental changes, and to examine the ecological mechanisms governing these delays, such as generational turnover and natural succession.

The candidate will analyse multi-taxa time-series of species diversity and abundance at large geographical scales, by applying state-of-the-art statistical techniques, such as the Integrated Nested Laplace Approximation (INLA). Furthermore, the student will gain experience in the management and processing of large datasets, the use of Geographical Information Systems and mathematical modelling. The student will be supervised by an interdisciplinary team of researchers with expertise in applying statistical techniques to better understand fundamental ecological processes.

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Overview

The environment is changing faster than at any time in recorded history due to a range of factors including climate change, habitat loss, renewable energy developments, pollution and over-exploitation of natural resources. These changes are having profound effects on biodiversity and human and animal health, and we need to be able to predict the consequences.

Our School integrates studies of the effects of environmental change operating at all levels of biological organisation. For instance, at the cellular level we are investigating how environmental conditions influence physiological and molecular processes including metabolism, oxidative damage, telomere loss and the rate of ageing. This is linked to studies of how individual animals and plants cope with environmental fluctuations, and how in turn this influences population dynamics, species interactions (including those between parasites, vectors and their hosts) and community structure. We conduct both short-term experiments and long-term monitoring of wild populations (at a range of field sites including loch and woodland research programmes at SCENE, our field station on the banks of Loch Lomond).

We have many links to other research being undertaken both within the School and the wider university. For example:

• the effect of environmental conditions on disease transmission or food production
• investigation of how animals evolve in the face of changing environments
• links with geographers, statisticians and mathematicians in the College of Science and Engineering

A variety of approaches are used, including collection of experimental and observational data, epidemiological, mathematical, computational and statistical modelling, bioinformatics, physiology, parasitology, immunology and polyomics (genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics). Individual research projects are tailored around the expertise of principal investigators within our Schools. Basic and applied science projects are available involving field, laboratory and in silico approaches within research programs underway in both the UK and overseas.

Specific areas of interest include:

• conservation management of African ecosystems
• protected area management
• measuring biodiversity and abundance (this presumably overlaps with other themes)
• human dimensions of conservationAquatic ecosystem connectivity
• sustainable aquaculture
• behavioural and physiological approaches to improved production and welfare of farmed fish
• evolutionary ecology, life-history trade-offs and phenotypic evolution
• long-term effects of early environments on adult performance
• phenotypic plasticity and flexibility in variable environments
• ecology and physiology of marine animals
• effects of Marine Protected Areas
• effects of climate change on the abundance, body size, physiology and behaviour of aquatic organisms
• fisheries-induced evolution
• applied poultry science
• evolutionary processes within rare fish populations
• conservation strategies for rare and endangered fish and bird species
• control of invasive non-native species
• impact of freshwater and marine renewable technologies on fish
• evolutionary and ecological impacts on parasite life cycles
• avian behaviour and  ecology, including both marine and terrestrial birds
• changes in phenology and in daily rhythms
• migration and movement of birds, mammals and fish
• understanding how biological clocks affect organisms' response to environmental change
• effects of urbanisation on health of individuals, populations and ecosystems
• effects of light pollution
• understanding how biological clocks help or hinder organisms' adjustment to environmental change
• cold adaptation in marine mammals and birds
• the effect of environmental stress on the physiology, behaviour and life histories
• applied poultry science
• ecology of neotropical rainforest birds
• the effect of fishing practices on the evolution of wild fish populations (fisheries induced evolution)
• the effects of animal physiology and environmental change on animal social behaviour and collective decision-making
• effects of exposure to pollutants on physiological systems
• possible transmission of antimicrobial resistance between species through environmental pollution
• effect of climate change and deforestation on vector-borne disease
• data-driven modelling of population dynamics and epidemics
• developing new methods for species distribution modelling

Study options

PhD

• Duration: 3/4 years full-time; 5 years part-time

Individual research projects are tailored around the expertise of principal investigators.

Integrated PhD programmes (5 years)

Our Integrated PhD allows you to combine masters level teaching with your chosen research direction in a 1+3+1 format. 

International students with MSc and PhD scholarships/funding do not have to apply for 2 visas or exit and re-enter the country between programmes. International and UK/EU students may apply.

Year 1

Taught masters level modules are taken alongside students on our masters programmes. Our research-led teaching supports you to fine tune your research ideas and discuss these with potential PhD supervisors. You will gain a valuable introduction to academic topics, research methods, laboratory skills and the critical evaluation of research data. Your grades must meet our requirements in order to gain entry on to your pre-selected PhD research project. If not, you will have the options to pay outstanding MSc fees and complete with masters degree only.

Years 2, 3 and 4

PhD programme with research/lab work, completing an examinable piece of independent research in year 4.

Year 5

Thesis write up.

MSc (Research)

• Duration: 1 year full-time; 2 years part-time