Admission requirements
Advice:
BSc-course Biodiversity, theory and practice of systematics or equivalent knowledge of phylogenetic reconstruction.
MSc-course Advanced Statistics.
Contact
Coordinator: J.A. Miller and Dr. R.A. Vos
Email:
Description
The main aim of this course is to introduce a number of approaches, methods and issues that are relevant to biological taxonomy and biodiversity in the wide sense, including actual and historical analyses of biodiversity and evolution. The following topics will be introduced and practiced:
Taxonomy as an information storage and – retrieval system in the age of Internet.
Phylogenetic analysis: concepts and applications.
Analysis of geographic structure and gene flow in and between populations.
Analysis of historic and stratigraphic patterns and the timing and geographic context of reconstructed phylogenies.
Data analysis and management applied to (spatial) biodiversity data.
Learning goals
Course objectives:
To provide a theoretical basis and some practical experience for the a successful MSc research project at Naturalis: good understanding of concepts of time and space; of collection data, data basing and data mining; of the practice of phylogeny reconstruction; environmental DNA; of geographic data and species distributions; and of the integration of paleontological and recent data.
Final qualifications:
Theoretical understanding of, and hands-on experience with, current methods for storage and retrieval of taxonomic information, with phylogeny reconstruction, ancestral state reconstruction and dating techniques, geographic analysis and ecological niche modeling.
Timetable
From 22 November 2020 to 18 December 2020. Details will be provided in due time on Brightspace.
Mode of instruction
Lectures, computer exercises, literature study, demonstrations.
Assessment method
Written reports, oral presentation, and examination.
The final grade consists of the following partical grades:
Exam, 50%, passing grade required
Written report, 20%, passing grade required
Oral presentation, 20%, passing grade required
Participation, 10%, passing grade required
Inspection and feedback on the examination
The examination will be available for inspection in January 2021 by appointment and up to the deadline for submitting grades to the department.
Brightspace
All information of lectures and papers will be available on Brightspace.
Reading list
Relevant literature will be made available on Brightspace.
Registration
Via USIS
Exchange and Study Abroad students, please see the Prospective students website for more information on how to apply.