Postdoctoral Research Associate Position: Understanding the New England Land System
- Employer
- HARVARD UNIVERSITY
- Location
- Cambridge, Massachusetts (US)
- Closing date
- 14 Oct 2020
View more
- Academic Discipline
- Social Sciences, Geography
- Job Type
- Academic Posts, Postdocs, Research Related, Research Associate
- Contract Type
- Fixed Term
- Hours
- Full Time
Postdoctoral Research Associate Position: Understanding the New England Land System
School Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Department/Area Harvard Forest
Position Description
The Harvard Forest invites applications for a post-doctoral research position to contribute to a multi-institutional study of forest change in New England. The successful candidate will be a member of Jonathan Thompson’s Landscape Ecology Lab and be part of the Harvest Forest Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) program. The candidate will work with our existing landscape modeling framework and several large datasets to examine long-term broad-scale impacts of land use, climate change, invasive insects, and their interactions. Experience conducting regional- scale socio-ecological research is strongly preferred. The candidate should be interested in using landscape simulations and forest inventory data toward the overarching goal of understanding how diverse land uses—including conservation, forestry, land conversion and agriculture—affect the coupled natural and human systems in New England. While there are some side boards on the research topics, there is also substantial flexibility regarding the exact specification of questions and methods.
Work Environment: The post-doc will be based at Harvard Forest in Petersham, Massachusetts. The Lab strives to foster a team environment but the actual research conducted by this post-doc will require substantial independence. Please learn more about our Lab at: https://harvardforest.fas.harvard.edu/jthompson
Basic Qualifications
Required Qualifications: Ph.D. (awarded by start date) in ecology, geography or a related field. Evidence of strong scholarship, including peer-reviewed publications. Proven ability to plan and conduct independent research projects from beginning to end. Interest in translating and communicating research for land-use decisions.
Additional Qualifications
Preferred Experience: Conducting complex spatial analyses (e.g., GIS, remote sensing, spatial statistics); landscape and/or earth system models (LANDIS-II, CLM), quasi-experimental methods (e.g., matching, counter-factual), analysis of large datasets (e.g., , FIA, PADUS, Census, NWOS); skilled at scripting within the R and/or Python programming languages. Candidates without these types of experience should clearly demonstrate how their skillset would benefit the lab.
Special Instructions
Send Cover letter, CV, PDFs of relevant publications, and the names and contact info for three references to Jonathan Thompson: jthomps@fas.harvard.edu
Contact Information
Jonathan Thompson
Harvard Forest
324 North Main Street
Petersham, MA 01366
Contact Email jthomps@fas.harvard.edu
Equal Opportunity Employer
Harvard University is an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, gender identity, sexual orientation, pregnancy and pregnancy-related conditions, or any other characteristic protected by law. Harvard is committed to enriching its educational experience and its culture through the diversity of its faculty, administration and staff. Harvard Forest is striving to be a welcoming and inclusive community and we encourage all qualified applicants to apply. Please see the Harvard Forest Diversity and Inclusion Statement.
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