Applications are invited for a PhD fellowship/scholarship at Graduate School of Technical Sciences, Aarhus University, Denmark, within the Bioscience programme. The position is available from 1 May 2021 or later.
Title:
Costs and benefits of low dose toxicant exposures in interaction with environmental stress
Research area and project description:
The Department of Bioscience, Section for Terrestrial Ecology, at Aarhus University and the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Innovative Training Network (MSCA-ITN) project “CRronic exposure scenarios driving enviRONmental rIsks of Chemicals (CHRONIC)” offer an Early Stage Researcher (PhD Student) position “Costs and benefits of low dose toxicant exposures in interaction with environmental stress”.
CHRONIC is a European Training Network funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 956009. CHRONIC will include 13 PhD projects aimed at developing tools and approaches to identify relevant non-standard modes of toxic action for low-dose chronic chemical exposure and integrate these with environmental stressors. CHRONIC includes 10 academic institutions, research centres, government institutions, SMEs, and an NGO, all with extensive experience in education and training and a high state-of-the-art scientific and technical expertise and infrastructure. Therefore, this program will lay the basis for an integrated approach to environmental risk assessment that includes non-standard, yet ecologically relevant, endpoints and low-dose chronic chemical exposure as key elements. CHRONIC include training-by-research, joint courses covering technical, scientific, ethical, and transferable skills. Students will also engage actively in communication with scientific and public communities and be enrolled in an ambitious intersectional networking exchange plan to increase employability and provide a broad perspective for their future career plan.
The present PhD project will investigate interactive chronic, low-doses of a model toxicant and exposures to both stressful temperature and moisture conditions, as well as simulated natural fluctuations in temperature and moisture regimes (e.g. several regimes of increasing stress) in soil invertebrates. Studies will assess interactions among stressors affecting life history (e.g. fecundity and longevity) and underlying physiological mechanisms (e.g. adaptive hardening under stressful temperature and low humidity). Transcriptomic analysis of candidate genes (metallothioneins; immune system-related genes; ROS defence, heat shock proteins etc.) will be quantified to develop AOPs for chronic combined stressor exposures. The aim is to investigate and compare low-dose chronic chemical effects across different environmental conditions to determine the specificity or generality of interaction multiple stressor effects (additive, antagonistic, synergistic) and obtain fundamental understanding of the links between the molecular and the phenotypic responses.
Qualifications and specific competences:
The applicant must have a Master’s degree in biology, molecular biology, ecophysiology, environmental biology or other relevant fields, preferably with knowledge and experience in analytical chemistry, transcriptomics, ecological genomics or environmental toxicology. Fluency in English (working language) is a requirement.
MSCA eligibility criteria:
At the date of recruitment the applicants for the MSCA fellowship must have no PhD and less than 4 years of full-time equivalent research experience from the award of the degree that entitles them to undertake a doctorate (either in the country in which the degree was obtained or in the country in which the applicant is to be recruited).
These eligibility requirements are non-negotiable, and ineligible applicants will not be considered.
Eligible applicants can be of any nationality.
Place of employment and place of work:
The place of employment is Aarhus University, and the place of work is the Department of Bioscience, Vejlsøvej 25, DK-8600 Silkeborg, Denmark.
Contacts:
Applicants seeking further information are invited to contact:
Professor Martin Holmstrup, Email: martin.holmstrup@bios.au.dk
Application procedures
Before you apply
Information and attachments:
Please be aware that you must have all relevant appendices, attachments, addresses for referees, etc. ready when you apply, as the entire application must be uploaded to the system in one go.
Documentation of language skills:
The English language requirement at the graduate school is comparable to an “English B level” in the Danish upper secondary school (“gymnasium”).
English language qualifications comparable to an “English B level” are documented by one of the following tests:
When to take the test and how to upload the documentation:
The test result must not be more than two years old at the time of application.
The English language test should be taken before applying for admission and uploaded under “language skills documentation” in the online application form.
It is possible to apply for admission before you have taken the test. In this case documentation stating that you have signed up for a test (please state expected submission date) must be uploaded. If the test result is not part of the original application the test result is to be sent to gsts@psys.au.dk no later than one month after the application deadline.
The following applicants are exempted from documenting their English qualifications/taking a test:
The programme committee may request further information or invite the applicant to attend an interview.
How to apply:
1) Find the application form:
Go to https://phd.tech.au.dk/for-applicants/apply-here/ - Note, the online application system opens on 1 December 2020.
Choose February 2021 Call with deadline 1 February 2021 at noon (11.59 AM CEST).
You will be directed to the call, and must choose the programme “Bioscience”.
2) Fill in the following information:
Next to some of the information fields you will find a number. Click on the number to get further directions on how to fill in the information field/what information is needed.
3) Application attachments:
Please be aware that you cannot submit the application if one or several of these documents have not been uploaded.
If you wish to upload more than one document under each section, you must scan/merge all documents into one large PDF file and upload this. Please note that we reserve the right to remove scientific papers, large reports, theses and the like. Instead you can indicate a URL where the information is available.
All information in the application must be in English or Danish, preferably English. A certified English translation is required for documents written in languages other than English or one of the Scandinavian languages (i.e. Norwegian, Swedish or Danish) languages.
As a minimum all applications must include (pdf-files only, max. 20 MB, no zip):
After submission of the application, you will receive a confirmation e-mail with an application ID, you should use for reference if needed.
The graduate school reserves the right to verify the authenticity of your educational diploma and transcripts:
Please note:
All interested candidates are encouraged to apply, regardless of their personal background.
