PhD position available
Application details: https://www.findaphd.com/search/projectDetails.aspx?PJID=94048&LID=4663
Investment
in cognitive traits, such as learning and memory, is expected to yield
fitness benefits through better decision-making, producing behavior that
is fine-tuned to the local environment. Yet the fact that animals vary
in their cognitive abilities, both between and within species, suggests
that such investment comes at a significant cost. We currently
understand little about what these costs are, because it is difficult to
manipulate cognitive abilities, and thus any relationship with other
traits is by nature correlational. In this project, we will capitalize
upon recent developments in insect cognitive neuroscience to overcome
this problem, using a uniquely tractable experimental system (the
bumblebee Bombus terrestris). We will focus upon (1) metabolic
costs of investment in cognition (2) potential evolutionary trade-offs
with immune function (3) impacts on life-history variables. In the
latter stages of the project, there will be the opportunity for the
student to develop further research questions according to their
interests, which may include (but are not limited to) the use of
transcriptomics to understand the genomic basis for cognitive
investment.
The successful applicant will be based at Royal Holloway University of London in the research group of Dr. Elli Leadbeater (http://ellileadbeater.wixsite.com/insectcognition),
and will be co-supervised by Dr. Steve Portugal at Royal Holloway and
Samraat Pawar at our DTP partnership institution, Imperial College. The
project will capitalize upon excellent ERC-funded social insect research
facilities at Royal Holloway, including indoor and outdoor apiaries,
bee rearing rooms and a dedicated cognition laboratory. The student will
join a large group of researchers interested in social insect behaviour
within our department, which provides an exceptionally stimuluating and
collaborative environment for the proposed research. Experimental work
will involve laboratory-based studies during both the summer and the
winter months, with the potential for campus-based fieldwork during the
summer months according to the student’s interests. Pre-application
informal enquiries are strongly encouraged. Please direct these to Elli
Leadbeater (Elli.Leadbeater@rhul.ac.uk).