BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DEPARTMENT MATTERS | January 9, 2015

Dear all,

happy new year to everyone! I hope you had a relaxing break and have come back rested and full of energy!

cheerio

Mariella

ps- this newsletter also includes all 2014 papers, media stories and announcements as s brief reminder of a very busy year!

General News and Announcements

A message from Craig Angus

G’day all. 

I’m announcing after 28.5 years I’ve now officially resigned from my employment at Macquarie University. Sarah Collinson is now acting fieldwork manager.

I wish to thank you all for your friendship & support, & the wonderful opportunities that you have given me that has allowed me to grow both professionally & into adulthood (been here since I was 21!).

I particularly thank those who I’ve closely worked within the areas of teaching, fieldwork management & research over the years, I’ll be contacting you soon to provide my new contact details.

I wish to thank my tech staff colleagues & I can’t emphasise enough how privileged I am to have worked with you all. Your passion & dedication has certainly has rubbed off on me & I hope my contribution has helped you all as well.

Finally I thank Professor Andy Beattie, who employed me way back on the 27th July 1987. We have had many adventures together in the field & in the lab & the opportunities you created for me were life changing & contributed greatly to all aspects of my professional life. The subsequent friendships I’ve had & even marriage are largely down to your belief in me.

I wish you & your families a very happy Christmas & my very best wishes to you all for 2015!

Craig.

Call for Amazing Race 2015 Biology Checkpoint 

Mq Uni is running it’s own Amazing Race again this year and Biology could be a checkpoint for the awesomely fun  day.

The proposed date is Thursday 12 March, 2-5pm.

Checkpoints involve a feasible task that race teams need to accomplish, (can be a choice between 2 tasks) and getting this checked off so teams can go to the next race location. Checkpoints will need to be stationed for the duration of the race and instruction will need to be provided to race teams. If you or your team have an idea for an awesome checkpoint, send  them to Veronica Peralta, veronica.peralta@mq.edu.au Who will liaise with you and the Amazing Race contact, Amie O’Brien at Campus Life.

Check out pics of the fun time at the last Amazing Race.

Thanks, Veronica

Fruit and Veg at Biology – Call for Members

Fruit, veg, and other products are available every Wednesday week at the University through Harvest Hub. We have the potential to open a Hub at Biology for products to be delivered directly to us, but we need at least 7 members to join (Biology counts as 1, so that’s just 6 more Biology people. Members will:

• receive a standing order either weekly or fortnightly
• be charged one-off membership fee of $25. 
• receive an insulation bag for your orders to be packed in
• be requested to pack other members’ orders, on a rotating shift
• Orders can be cancelled for any week, with notice.

Please contact Veronica Peralta, veronica.peralta@mq.edu.au x9235 if you’re interested.

If this goes ahead, we can buy the Department’s fruit from this awesome distributor!

Teaching Lab Induction

• When: Tuesday 17th February, 9am – 12:30pm (morning tea at 10:10am)
• Where: red and Blue teaching Labs
• RSVP: to ray.duell@mq.edu.au, stating if you are doing it for the first time or as a refresher.
• Note: It is likely that we will have new computers in the teaching labs this semester, so it is advisable that anyone who previously done an induction to take a refresher course.

Casual Teaching Applications now open

Please read all information carefully on the application form and BIOL990 iLearn page.

Your application will be judged on your qualifications, experience and ability to follow the application instructions, as minimal teaching places are available.

To be eligible to apply for casual teaching you must:

• Be a HDR student
• Apply by 11:59pm Saturday 31st January, 2015
• Have completed a lab induction within the last 18 months (next one 9am-12:30 pm in the red & blue labs Tuesday 17th February, 2015)
• Submit a ONE page CV (in PDF format saved with your name in the document name), outlining any relevant qualification and teaching experience, to the CV submission link on the BIOL990 iLearn website (login using your student ID to https://ilearn.mq.edu.au/login/MQ/ contact Kath if you have any problems logging in)

Statistics workshops in Sydney

Dr Mark Griffin, Director of the Australian Development Agency for Statistics and Information Systems, will present three workshops on statistics at the University of Sydney in April 2015.

* April 7-8:  A Gentle Introduction to Statistics in SPSS and R

* April 11-12:  Introduction to Linear and Logistic Regression

* April 18-19:  Introduction to Longitudinal Data Analysis

For more information about these workshops please view the attached flyer, or visit our website at <www.adasis-oz.com/our-calendar>. For questions please contact Mark Griffin at m.griffin@adasis-oz.com or by phone on 0448 176 926.

Semester 1- 2015, Tech staff to courses allocation

See the attached for details on how units are being supported by technical staff in SEM1, 2015.

Sem 1 Allocations_2015_08Jan2015

The Science Experience January 2015 – student participation and volunteer opportunities

The National Indigenous Science Education Program (NISEP) presents The ConocoPhillips Science Experience here at the MQ campus next month from 14-16 January 2015. 

There is room for late student enrolments into this program.  So if you know of any kids heading into Years 9 or 10 next year who love science.. and they’ll be here  in Sydney in mid-January…  Get them to register for the 2015 Science Experience!

Participants can register their children online up to January 5 here:  http://www.scienceexperience.com.au/when-where/new-south-wales/macquarie-university-sydney

If you have some free time over the three event days January 14-16, and you are interested in volunteering as a demonstrator/guide, please let Joanne Jamie, Erin Rozgonyi or Asha Voorendt (asha.voorendt@students.mq.edu.au) know of your availability on any of these days.  There are several opportunities still available to assist the team.

Symposium: Ecology, Sensory Processes, and Cognition, Macquarie University: February 7, 2015

With the support of the Genes-to-Geosciences community at Macquarie University, a one-day symposium has been planned early in 2015 in honour of Professor Rüdiger Wehner of the Brain Research Institute, University of Zurich. The symposium is titled: Ecology, sensory processes, and cognition, and will be concerned with how diverse taxa of animals cope with the challenges of obtaining and using information needed for the niches that they occupy. Speakers include Mandyam Srinivasan, Allen Cheung, Jochen Zeil, Ajay Narendra, and Eric Warrant, as well as ‘animal behaviourists’ at Macquarie University.

Date: Saturday 7 February, 2015, 9:00-5:00

Place: Macquarie University campus, E7B T2

 Open to all. Please send enquiries to Ken Cheng: ken.cheng@mq.edu.au

Merit Scholar Research Assistants

Each year we fund around 30 Merit Scholars to assist on various research projects across the faculties, via a Merit Scholar Research Scholarship. If you:

• are involved in a research project that will be active between April – October 2015;
• would like a talented undergraduate student to assist with your project for 50 – 100 hours at no cost to you; and
• are in a position to offer some support and guidance to help your undergraduate assistant to develop research skills

then keep an eye on your inbox in the new year – I will be sending out a call for research projects in January/February. There is no limit to the number of projects nominated per faculty – I will advertise ALL nominated projects to the Merit Scholar cohort, and the projects which correspond with the best 30 applications will be offered an assistant. We will kick off with a launch on 30 April, and all hours must be completed by 30 October.

Dr Kevin Brooks from the Department of Psychology said of his experience with a Merit Scholar, “For me, it is one of the genuine pleasures of academic life to mentor a gifted and engaged student. If I ever find my enthusiasm waning, it is immediately reignited by young researchers with inquisitive minds.”

Georgia Scapens

Merit Scholars Program Coordinator

Level 1, E4A Building

Macquarie University 

NSW 2109 Australia

T: +61 2 9850 4753

georgia.scapens@mq.edu.au

An interesting paper (thanks to Rob H.)….see attached

Tallis et al inclusive conservation Nature 2014

Memorial: Professor David Choquenot

David was an MQ alumnus, having done his BSc here.

The University of Canberra invites you to attend a public memorial to pay tribute to

Professor David Choquenot

DATE: Wednesday, 14 January 2015

TIME: 3:00pm – 4:00pm

VENUE: Ann Harding Conference Centre, Building 24

Jobs

Assistant/Associate Professor of Biology, University of Richmond

Assistant/Associate Professor of Biology: The Department of Biology at the University of Richmond invites applications for a tenure track position as an assistant professor of biology; we also invite applications from exceptional candidates at the associate professor level who have demonstrated excellence in undergraduate education and research. The start date is August, 2015. Details here.

More Jobs

Two postdoc positions addressing questions in community ecology using automated tracking

Two postdoc positions are available to work on problems in community ecology in the lab of Dr. Anthony Dell (www.dellecologylab.org). Both positions will have some freedom to pursue a broad array of pure and applied questions, including (but not limited to) research on predator-prey interactions, interference competition, movement and behavior, body size, temperature, intraspecific variation, and metabolic theory. The main constraint is that the research should be broadly relevant to the ecology of large river systems (aquatic and/or terrestrial) and should take advantage of developing methods in automated tracking (see Dell et al. TREE 29(7):417-428). The work would ideally include both theoretical and empirical aspects, in the laboratory and/or field. These positions link in with a developing network of tracking laboratories focused on addressing ecological questions, including Dr. Van Savage at UCLA (http://faculty.biomath.ucla.edu/vsavage/) and Dr. Ulrich Brose at the University of Goettingen (http://www.uni-goettingen.de/en/189430.html).

Both postdocs will be based at the National Great Rivers Research & Education Center (NGRREC) (see www.ngrrec.org), a state-of-the-art research facility on the banks of the Mississippi River about 30 minutes from downtown St Louis, with expected visits to collaborating research groups and local/international field sites as required.

An ideal applicant for one position will have strong quantitative skills, including mathematical, computational, and/or programming. Experience in computer vision, and particularly automated tracking software, would be advantageous, as would expertise in statistics, ecoinformatics, and ecologically-relevant theory (e.g., metabolic theory). The other applicant should be more empirically inclined, with expertise in conducting laboratory and/or field experiments, but also with (or can learn) strong quantitative skills relevant to ecology. Postdocs will work together on projects, utilizing their complementary skills to undertake ecological research with significant basic and applied benefits.

Successful candidates will have compelling publication records (commensurate with experience), strong interests in developing their own research questions (within the broad interests of the lab), the ability to work independently and in larger groups, and excellent verbal and written communication skills. Postdocs will assist in the day-to-day running of the laboratory, including collaboration with and monitoring of less senior members.

These are annual positions for a duration of up to two years, with the second year dependent on satisfactory performance. Additional funding may become available after two years, with applicants helping to secure such funds. Salary will be ~$40,000 year, with benefits. Funding for research and travel will be provided as budgeted. To apply please send an email to adell@lc.edu with a single pdf that includes i) a cover letter including introduction and statement of research interests, ii) a brief CV, and iii) the names and contact details of three academic references. Applicants should also send up to 3 relevant publications. Applications from both within and outside the US are welcome. Start date is flexible, but preference will be given to applicants who can begin early 2015. Review of applications will begin on the 8^th January 2015 and continue until both positions are filled. Address additional questions to adell@lc.edu. 

New Publications

In the Media

Early animal evolution interview

Paleobiologist Glenn Brock recently attended the 4th International Palaeontological Congress in Mendoza Argentina.

He was interviewed by the team at Palaeocast about his research into early animal evolution.

Read more »

Recent Completions