Within the Department of Community and Ecosystem Research of the IGB in Berlin we invite applications for a PhD student position (full time, 3 years with a potential prolongation of 1 year) in Freshwater Plant Stress Ecology starting on 01.09.2024.
We are looking for a highly motivated candidate to study the tolerance of the freshwater model plant Stuckenia pectinata to warming and anoxia including the role of its endophytes and microbiome. This work is embedded in the DFG Research Unit “Physiological and Evolutionary Adaptation of Plants to Co-occurring Abiotic and Biotic Challenges” at Kiel University (speaker Prof. Eva Stukenbrock). The Research Unit aims to gain a better understanding of how plants respond to different combinations of stressors. Most of the subprojects deal with different terrestrial plants, while our subproject will focus on the adaptation of freshwater and marine plants to warming and hypoxia. Field studies and laboratory experiments will be conducted to elucidate the potential role of endophytes and the abundance of associated microbes across a gradient of anoxia and warming. Combinations of warming and hypoxia will be tested for their effects on growth and physiology of S. pectinata. Through two central projects of this research unit, additional support in high-throughput microbiome analysis as well as in transcriptomics and metabolomic analysis along with systems biological approaches is provided. The effects of pathogens on the composition of the plant microbiome of S. pectinata and on its tolerance to stressors will be assessed using pathogen-simulating elicitors. The successful candidate will closely cooperate with another doctoral candidate in the group of Prof. Thorsten Reusch at GEOMAR Kiel and joint experiments with freshwater and marine plants will be conducted at GEOMAR in Kiel.
