Working in Maklakov's Group

PhD positions

We currently have no open positions for PhD students in my lab. However, if you have ideas for applying for your own funding I am happy to support such applications.

Potential MSc projects

1. Learning-longevity trade-off: using roundworms selected for long- and short-life to test for their ability to make novel associations (Contact: Martyna.Zwoinska@ebc.uu.se)

2. Growth and lifespan: fast growth often means short life – if animals evolve long life, will they pay the cost of decelerated growth? (Contact: Martin.Lind@ebc.uu.se)

3. Sexual conflict or “good genes”? Will selection on high-quality males result in high-quality or low-quality females? (Contact: Alexei.Maklakov@ebc.uu.se)

4. Evolution of post-reproductive lifespan: humans are not the only animals that survive long after they lost the ability to reproduce – how can such trait evolve? (Contact: Foteini.Spagopoulou@ebc.uu.se)

5. I will be happy to supervise any scientifically exciting MSc project that you come up with that falls broadly within my research interests – life-history evolution, sexual selection, cognition and learning – (see above but also check my list of collaborations for some examples!).

Students interested in joining our lab for a research training or a masters are more than welcome to contact me at any time directly for discussion of possible projects.

Postdoctoral opportunities

There are several Swedish (e.g. VR, Wenner-Gren, Swedish Institute, Carl Tryggers) and international (e.g. Marie-Curie) funding bodies that can provide fellowships for young researchers who wish to conduct a post-doc in Sweden. Some of these rely on Sweden-based PI to submit an application; others require a perspective post doc to submit one. Drop me a line if you are thinking about applying and your research interests are broadly similar to ours (also check our current projects and collaborations).

Evolutionary Biology Centre in Uppsala University is probably the largest conglomeration of evolutionary biologists in Europe, situated in a largely ‘student‘ town (there is also another university, SLU) – therefore, it provides a multitude of opportunities for collaboration as well as socializing.