Join the lab | Jobs

Join the lab!

Interested students are welcome to participate in the research conducted in our lab throughout the year. Open PhD and Postdoc positions will be announced at this page. We offer different topics for bachelor and master theses and also welcome your ideas and suggestions for other thesis topics. Please find a selection of topics listed or request further topics by contacting Prof. Nico Eisenhauer.

PhD positions

The Jena Experiment is seeking PhD students, postdoctoral researchers and technical staff

The Jena Experiment (www.the-jena-experiment.de) has been running since 2002 and aims to uncover the mechanisms that determine BEF relationships in the short- and in the long-term. During the last years we provided novel empirical evidence that ecological and evolutionary processes are intertwined in determining biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relationships, and long-term experiments are key not only to gain a basic understanding of the relative importance as well as interactions of these processes but also to apply these concepts to better provisioning of ecosystem functions and stability. In the next few years, we will focus on the biodiversity drivers of ecosystem stability, including temporal stability using unique time series and stability in response to extreme climate events, such as drought, flooding, hot spells, and exceptional frost periods.

To learn more about the open positions and how to apply, follow: https://the-jena-experiment.de/index.php/job-opportunities/

Promotionsprojekt „Trockenes Grünland“

Haben Sie einen Master-Abschluss in der Ökologie (oder in einem verwandten biologischen Teilgebiet) und möchten den Einfluss von extremen Dürre-Ereignissen auf Ökosysteme erforschen und zu diesem Thema auch promovieren? Suchen Sie nach einer Möglichkeit, unter sehr guter fachlicher Betreuung einen eigenen Projektantrag für eine solche Promotionsstelle an die Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt (DBU) zu richten?

Wir – Prof. Nico Eisenhauer (iDiv Leipzig: Experimentelle Interaktionsökologie) und Dr. Harald Auge (UFZ Halle: Experimentelle Ökologie von Populationen und Lebensgemeinschaften) – möchten Sie gern dabei unterstützen, einen solchen DBU-Antrag anzufertigen, und möchten Ihre Promotionsarbeit bei einer Bewilligung dieses Antrags auch betreuen.

Mehr Infos finden Sie hier.

Postdoc positions

Humboldt scholarship

The Humboldt Foundation is scouting for researchers (postdocs) from underrepresented regions of the globe. For that, they developed a scouting program particularly dedicated to supporting excellent female scientists, and I have the honor to serve as one of their scouts. In this context, I am looking for a scientist with expertise in soil microbial ecology and data analysis/synthesis.
For this round of candidates (2024), the topic is Cross-kingdom synthesis of temporal and spatial soil microbial community analyses along grassland diversity gradients. The project (details below) will take place at the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig in collaboration with the University of Amsterdam (Anna Heintz-Buschart).

More information can be found here.

Non-scientific personnel

We currently have no vacancies

Student helper positions

We currently have no vacancies

Bachelor theses

We offer many topics for bachelor and master theses in our working group. Finding the right topic is not easy and we are happy to introduce our topics to you in more detail or discuss further ideas.

Title: Linking stress-induced root morphology traits and nematode communities
Student profile: Bachelor or Master student
Thesis profile: Greenhouse work, lab work, microscopy work, and data analyses
Start / Timeframe: May/June 2024 or later
Language: English
Related to the project/more general information: PhytOakmeter
Contact: April Lyn Leonar
PDF with details

Title: Microclimate effects on ecosystem functions in the MyDiv tree diversity experiment
Student profile: Bachelor or Master student
Thesis profile: field and lab work, student should not be afraid of statistics and large data sets
Start / Timeframe: Start around March/April 2024 would be ideal
Language: English or German
Related to the project/more general information: MyDiv
Contact: Simone Cesarz
PDF with details

Title: The effects of tree diversity and mycorrhizal types on the composition and diversity of nematode communities
Student profile: Bachelor or Master student
Thesis profile: no lab work, data is ready. Thesis can be also done 100% remotely
Start / Timeframe: could start at any time
Language: English
Related to the project/more general information: MyDiv
Contact: Huimin Yi
PDF with details

Title: Global change effects on soil microbes over time
Student profile: Bachelor or Master student
Thesis profile: Field work, lab work, and data analyses.
Start / Timeframe: April/May 2024 or later.
Language: German and English, the thesis would ideally be written in English.
Related to the project/more general information: GCEF
Contact: Marie Sünnemann
PDF with details

Title: Understory vegetation effect on air temperature
Student profile: Interest in climate and biodiversity indices with a strong taste for mathematics
Thesis profile: Data analysis and modelling. No lab or field work.
Start / Timeframe: The thesis can start at any time.
Language: English
Contact: Remy Beugnon
PDF with details

Title: Impacts of mycorrhizal fungi on leaf pathogen and herbivory
Student profile: Likes lab work and wants to learn statistical methods
Thesis profile: Lab and field work, plant data
Start / Timeframe: Sampling starts in September 2022
Language: English
Related to the project/more general information: MyDiv
Contact: Shan Luo
PDF with details

Title: Manipulation of soil biodiversity to investigate soil ecosystem functioning
Student profile: Likes lab work and to try things out, wants to develop own hypotheses
Thesis profile: Lab work such as microscopy work and a pot experiment in a climate chamber
Start / Timeframe: Somewhen after June 2023
Language: English or German
Contact: Simone Cesarz
PDF with details

Master theses

We offer many topics for bachelor and master theses in our working group. Finding the right topic is not easy and we are happy to introduce our topics to you in more detail or discuss further ideas.

Title: Soil microbial communities under litter exclusion
Student profile: Likes lab work
Thesis profile: Mostly lab work, single field days
Start / Timeframe: Flexible
Language: English or German
Related to the project/more general information: MyDiv
Contact: Olga Ferlian
PDF with details

Title: Modelling soil microbial carbon dynamics in Germany
Student profile: Interested in ecology. Willing to learn statistics and computational methods.
Thesis profile: Data analysis and modelling using existing data. No lab or field work.
Start / Timeframe: The thesis can start at any time.
Language: English
Contact: Guillaume Patoine
PDF with details