Large-scale statistical modelling of benthic communities
Postdoctoral position of Bastien Mourguiart (2023-2024)
How do environmental conditions and biotic interactions shape the species composition of benthic communities?
Answering this question is a step towards a better understanding of (i) benthic ecosystem dynamics; and thus (ii) the cascading consequences of ecosystem regime shifts on benthic biodiversity. It implies identifying biotic and abiotic drivers of benthic community composition. To this end, we gather available data from large-scale surveys (e.g. Reef Life Survey) and develop appropriate statistical models (e.g. species distribution models) to analyse them.
Although ecologists have always studied the drivers of community composition, there are still many methodological challenges. We therefore navigate between ecological and methodological challenges. Specifically, this postdoc aims to: (1) model the patterns of benthic biodiversity in North-East Atlantic; (2) identify large-scale relationships between benthic biogenic reefs and associated faunal biodiversity; while (3) accounting for potential mismatches between spatio-temporal resolutions of ecological processes and the available data used to model them.
Supervisor: Martin Marzloff (LEBCO)
Collaborations:
Funding:
