The Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology (EEB), Tulane University, invites applications for three tenure-track positions, two emphasizing field or laboratory research and one emphasizing computational research in ecology or evolutionary biology.
Submit a letter of application indicating the position(s) of interest, curriculum vitae, statements of research and teaching interests, selected publications, and names and contact information for three references to: Faculty Searches, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, 400 Lindy Boggs Center, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118-5698. To assure timely receipt, all documents can be submitted via email to:
Review of applications will begin October 15, 2008, and the searches will remain open until the positions are filled. Tulane University is an Affirmative Action/Equal Employment Opportunity/ADA Employer. Women and minorities are encouraged to apply.
We seek highly qualified candidates with disciplinary and taxonomic expertise in any area of ecology and evolutionary biology. EEB is most interested in filling the advertized positions with outstanding candidates carrying out innovative research involving multi-disciplinary approaches. Candidates conducting research in tropical biology, wetlands ecology, and global change biology – three focal areas of research in the Department – are strongly encouraged to apply.
For the position emphasizing computational research, the first four years will be partly funded by the Center for Computational Science (CCS). Tulane University has extensive computational resources and infrastructure that will be immediately available to the successful candidate through CCS. The successful candidate will be expected to be an active participant in appropriate CCS activities, interact with CCS researchers, have an interest in multi-disciplinary projects and lead computational projects in collaborative groups. Based on a commitment to build upon existing strengths, we are particularly interested in candidates with experience in one or more of the following: spatially-explicit models, Bayesian statistics, multivariate analyses, ordinary or partial differential equation epidemiological models, age-structured models, population genetics, ecosystems models, climate change modeling, landscape ecology, bioinformatics, computational phylogenetics, or theoretical/empirical synthesis. Modeling and simulation approaches could be deterministic or stochastic. Teaching qualifications include skills that can augment the existing quantitative courses in EEB and CCS.
Required qualifications for all advertized positions include a Ph.D. degree and demonstrated excellence in research. The potential to obtain competitive extramural funding is also an important consideration. Postdoctoral experience is preferred.
Candidates filling the advertized positions will be expected to develop vigorous, nationally competitive research programs based on extramural funding. Successful candidates also will be expected to teach courses at all levels of the undergraduate and graduate curriculum. Specific responsibilities for courses will be discussed during interviews.
The search committees for the positions are listed below. The committee members may be contacted for further information about the searches.
Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Searches: Blum, Darwin (chair), and Heins
Computational Biology Search: Bart, Chambers, Sherry (chair)
In addition to the research opportunities regional habitats afford, Tulane offers various opportunities for interdisciplinary collaborations within the university and with other regional institutions. The EEB Department collaborates closely with the Department of Earth and Environmental Science (see below for college and divisional affiliations), the Stone Center for Latin American Studies, and the Tulane-Xavier Center for Bioenvironmental Research. Our program in global change biology has strong ties with the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences (EES). The Director (Torbjörn Törnqvist) of the National Institute for Climatic Change Research (NICCR) – Coastal Center (Department of Energy) which operates at Tulane is a member of that department, and the Co-director of the NICCR – Coastal Center (Jeff Chambers) is a member of EEB. Opportunities also exist for collaboration with faculty at other area universities and with scientists at the National Wetlands Research Center (Department of the Interior) at the University of Louisiana, Lafayette.
Applicants are encouraged to visit the web sites for Tulane University (http://tulane.edu/), the School of Science and Engineering (http://www.sse.tulane.edu/pages/home.php), and the EEB Department (http://www.eebio.tulane.edu/) for general information about faculty, courses, and academic programs.
As part of the university-wide reorganization and renewal plan following Hurricane Katrina, EEB became part of the School of Science and Engineering (SSE). The Department is in the Division of Earth and Ecological Science along with the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, with which we interact.
Our faculty, postdocs, and students -- graduate and undergraduate alike -- create, communicate, and apply knowledge of organisms, populations, communities, ecosystems and global systems. We pursue our mission through integrative research and teaching in conservation biology, ecosystem ecology, evolutionary biology, quantitative ecology, tropical ecology, and systematic biology. Our research emphasizes the broad disciplinary areas of tropical biology, wetlands ecology, and global change biology. The faculty is dedicated to enriching the capacity of students to learn, think, act, lead and contribute across a wide range of disciplines, from biology, environmental science and conservation to law, medicine and public.
EEB presently has six tenured or tenure-track faculty representing a variety of scholarly fields within organismal biology. The Department intends to enrich its mission and research emphasis through strategic hiring of new faculty. The addition of the three advertized positions will bring EEB to a total of nine tenured or tenure-track faculty. With the anticipated addition of new positions in years to come, EEB should grow to as many as 15 faculty based on school-wide goals outlined by the Dean of SSE.
In addition to the six tenured or tenure-track faculty, the Department also has one Professor of the Practice and two are laboratory supervisors. The commitment of these three persons teaching undergraduate and graduate courses enables the Department to meet the course needs of students while allowing tenured and tenure-track faculty to maintain highly productive research programs.
At present 25 doctoral students and 4 master’s students are enrolled in the EEB graduate program. EEB graduate students typically receive tuition waivers coupled with financial support through any of three major funding sources. Support includes university teaching assistantships (nine-month stipend, $20,680), research assistantships (support from faculty grants and contracts), or through four-year Louisiana Board of Regents Graduate Fellowships (annual stipend of $26,000 for fellowship beginning 2009 fall).
The graduate program in EEB was reviewed by an external panel in 2003 as part of a review of science departments at Tulane. The evaluation of the Department was very positive: “The EEB program has the potential to bring national visibility to Tulane’s science programs….In brief, the EEB program has come a long way since its organization in 1990 and…they hold the promise of becoming a niche program with good national visibility.”
Tulane is a highly selective university that offers abundant opportunities for innovative undergraduate teaching. The EEB Department encourages faculty to explore traditional instructional venues, such as lecture, laboratory, and seminar courses, as well as specialized honors seminars, writing-intensive courses, service-learning, courses for freshmen, field courses, collaborative teaching, interdisciplinary colloquia, and independent studies and undergraduate honors thesis research.
The EEB Department offers two majors, one in ecology and evolutionary biology
and the other in environmental biology. There are approximately 80 undergraduate
EEB majors in either the traditional ecology and evolutionary biology track
or the environmental biology track.
The EEB Department presently shares facilities in four buildings (Lindy Boggs Center, Israel Bioenvironmental Sciences Building, Stern Hall, and Stanley Thomas Hall) on the uptown campus. A proposal for another new science building is now being developed by SSE.
The Department has custody of several nationally recognized museum collections. Most notable are the zoological collections of the Tulane University Museum of Natural History, including the Royal D. Suttkus Fish Collection (a National Center of Ichthyology Research Resource collection; over 7,000,000 specimens) and other collections in herpetology (90,000 specimens) and invertebrate zoology (25,000 specimens). The zoological collections emphasize fauna of the Gulf South region and are housed off campus at a facility in Belle Chasse 15 miles from the main campus. The Tulane Herbarium (a National Resource Collection), holds specimens of algae, bryophytes, and vascular plants, all housed in Stanley Thomas Hall on the main campus in New Orleans. The vascular plant herbarium includes about 115,000 specimens of worldwide representation, but is strongest in the flora of the southeastern United States, southern California, the Rocky Mountain region of Colorado, and northern Latin America.
On-campus and off-campus greenhouses include several thousand square feet for teaching and research use. Faculty research laboratories also house shared walk-in or cabinet growth chambers.
A 500-acre tract of bottomland hardwood forest in Belle Chasse 15 miles from the main campus serves as a biological field station. This facility is available for faculty and student research as well as an outdoor laboratory for EEB courses.
Computational resources are available through the CCS at Tulane (http://www.ccs.tulane.edu). The CCS offers access to a Linux cluster for single-processor or parallel computing, specialized software, and full hardware/software administration. New nodes can easily be added to the cluster by individual faculty. Supercomputing resources are also available on the Louisiana Optical Network Initiative (LONI) grid, of which Tulane is part. The CCS also offers multi-disciplinary research projects, seminars, and opportunities for collaborations and hosting postdocs.
The Center for Bioenvironmental Research is multi-university and multi-campus group with offices on Tulane's uptown and downtown campuses and at Xavier University in New Orleans. Not an academic program per se, the CBR develops sponsors and coordinates many research, education and stewardship programs.
Tulane has had a long and distinguished record of tropical and subtropical research distributed among several departments and research centers. The existence of considerable infrastructure supporting tropical studies is a major strength of the Department and of Tulane University.
EEB faculty and graduate students currently are conducting research in Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Jamaica, Trinidad, Mexico, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Ecuador, Suriname, and Brazil. Tulane maintains membership in the Organization for Tropical Studies (OTS), a consortium of North American and Latin American universities and research institutions dedicated primarily to tropical education and research. OTS membership benefits Tulane by facilitating contact with other tropical ecologists, supporting graduate-level tropical biology courses for Tulane students (more than one student attends an OTS course annually), and supporting Tulane undergraduate study abroad programs in Costa Rica and South Africa.
The Roger Thayer Stone Center for Latin American Studies offers opportunity
for multidisciplinary research and teaching with emphasis on Latin American
ecology and environmental issues. CLAS is one of the pre-eminent Latin-Americanist
institutions in the country. CLAS also provides internal support for graduate
student research.
The Neotropical Ecology Institute, affiliated with the Stone Center, is an interdisciplinary
program, primarily comprised of scientists and social scientists, dedicated
to scientific research and education on the ecology, development, and environment
of tropical regions of Latin America. It supports symposia, courses (e.g., the
Yucatan Colloquium), graduate research support, participation in OTS activities,
and seminar series.
Tulane's Payson Center for International Development, with graduate programs in Latin America, Africa, and Asia, works to facilitate international and sustainable development using information technology. The Payson Center works closely with Tulane's other programs in environmental biology.
The Howard-Tilton Memorial Library (the University's general reference library), the Meade Natural History Library, and the Latin American Library all provide excellent support and reference materials for all types of biological research, but especially for research emphasizing tropical and subtropical biology. Additional resources are available through interlibrary loans and extensive electronic retrieval services.
Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology
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Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, Tulane University. All Rights Reserved.