PhD opportunity: Soil fauna ecology

This fully funded PhD scholarship provides an exciting opportunity to investigate the role of soil faunal communities in regulating key biological processes of soil nitrogen and phosphorus cycles in agricultural lands.

Soil fauna are critical of soil biodiversity and significantly drive litter decomposition, microbial community composition, and nutrient cycling. This project aims to identify soil faunal communities, reveal their interactions with soil microorganisms, and decipher their roles in regulating nitrogen and phosphorus cycles using combined morphological identification, advanced stable isotope tracing technique, and state-of-the-art molecular approaches. This project will develop new standardized methodologies and generate a new framework that can assist soil biodiversity assessment and conservation and provide significant benefits for improved soil health and agricultural productivity.

The successful applicant will be based at Murdoch University within the Centre of Sustainable Farming System (SoilsWest and Entomology groups), who will access the state-of-the-art facilities in Murdoch.  This PhD is part of a larger program of research collaboration between Murdoch University, University of Melbourne, and University of Western Sydney.  This collaborative research will involve the study of soil fauna from across Australia.