The ForBio Annual Meeting is going fully virtual! We have opened the registration and are looking forward to an exciting meeting with talks and keynotes. We will also be looking at creating participation hubs so that people from the same institution can gather and join the meeting together in a distributed hybrid meeting model.
The registration deadline is October 31st, 2020
At ForBio we are quickly adapting to the 'new normal’ with virtual courses and meetings. Not all courses can be taught online, and we are eagerly hoping to run hands-on taxonomy courses again in 2021. This newsletter gives you an update on our course program with the latest courses and deadlines, as well as job opportunities.
November 2–6, 2020, Gothenburg Global Biodiversity Center
The course will introduce the basic R syntax for dealing with the most common spatial data types as well as specific R-packages to perform basic spatial analysis. Application deadline: October 5th 2020
ForBio and UiB course: Introduction to phylogenetic methods November 9–13, 2020, University of Bergen, Norway
The is an introductory course that is aimed at students who will need to perform phylogenetic analyses in their work, but who have little or no experience with phylogenetic analyses. The course will cover all basic aspects of phylogenetic analyses with emphasis on use of DNA data. Students will learn how to prepare their data, explore its properties and how to analyze it using distance, parsimony, likelihood and Bayesian methods. In the last two days students will also get an introduction to molecular dating with focus on the use of BEAST and to comparative methods used to study the evolution of discrete and continuous traits. Application deadline: October 5th 2020
February 8–13, 2021, The Arctic University Museum of Norway, Tromsø
DNA metabarcoding is a rapid method of biodiversity assessment utilizing environmental DNA (DNA obtained from sediments, soils, water etc) which combines two technologies: DNA based species identification and high-throughput DNA sequencing. While working on bioinformatic analyses using Obitools and R/R-studio, we also discuss field sampling and wet lab design, as well as more subject-specific questions of various applications of DNA metabarcoding. These will include sedimentary DNA, diet analyses, paleoDNA studies among others. Application deadline: December 11th 2020
February 21–27, 2021, Drøbak Marine Station, University of Oslo
Polyploidy is widespread and frequent in plants (including many crops), but also occurs in animals such as fish and amphibians. However, our understanding of the genetics of polyploid populations and populations of mixed ploidy is still poor. This is mainly because population genetics theory was originally developed for diploids. Moreover, there is often a gap between theory developed for polyploids and its practical implementation. This practically-oriented course will attempt to bridge this gap. Simulation-based exercises (among others using R) will elucidate theoretical foundations of both diploid and polyploid population genetics. Additionally, analyses of real or realistic example datasets (microsatellite and SNP markers) will give participants hands-on training in several available methods for the population genetic analysis of polyploids. Application deadline: November 1st 2020
Courses postponed due to COVID-19 pandemic with registration to be re-opened in 2021 following the national Norwegian Guidelines on international travel
Please welcome Quentin Mauvisseau, who has been appointed as a ForBio coordinator. Quentin is a postdoctoral researcher at Natural History Museum, University of Oslo working on eDNA in aquatic environments. The group is led by Hugo de Boer at Natural History Museum, University of Oslo. The rest of the team consists of Elisabeth Stur at NTNU University Museum in Trondheim, Galina Gusarova at Tromsø Museum, University of Tromsø – the Arctic University of Norway, and Nataliya Budaeva at University Museum of Bergen, University of Bergen.
Funding opportunities
ForBio Course grants
These course grants enable ForBio members to attend courses with a taxonomic focus that ForBio does not offer, but which are relevant for the current or future research interests and needs of the ForBio member. ForBio will fund members based in Norway (http://www.forbio.uio.no/membership/). The grants can cover the course fee, travel and accommodation, and a detailed budget should be included in the application (grants are up to 30 000 NOK). Please note that we have a limited budget for travel grants and we will prioritize grant applications that most closely meet the objectives of this program. The application procedure requires you to fill out a ForBio course grant application. At the end of the form you will need to attach (1) a letter of recommendation from your main supervisor, and (2) a personal CV.
ForBio & Transmitting Science ForBio organises some courses together with Transmitting Science (announced in the ForBio website). For these courses, ForBio will cover the registration fee for all accepted ForBio members. In addition, ForBio will cover travel and accommodation for ForBio members affiliated to Norwegian institutions. In order to benefit from this agreement, you need to indicate you are a ForBio member when registering through the transmitting Science website. A 30% confirmation fee may be required when registering; this will be reimbursed to ForBio members after the course.
ForBio members and associates also get a 20% discount on ALL Transmitting Science courses. You just need to indicateyour ForBio affiliation when registering.
Predoctoral Research Associate position in genomics of species identification in sponges (Phylum Porifera).
Department of Earth- and Environmental Sciences (Chair of Paleontology and Geobiology) and the GeoBio-Center of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) München. For more information contact Professor Gert Wörheide geobiologie@geo.lmu.de Application deadline: 31 October 2020
Post doc in Biological Oceanography. Department of Biosciences, Fisheries and Economy, UiT The Arctic University of Norway Application deadline:8 November 2020
TIP: Lots of interesting jobs and other opportunities are published on the Evolution Directory (EvolDir) mailing list, and not all of them make it to the ForBio newsletter! You can subscribe to EvolDir or check out the recent postings here.