Thesis and Project Courses

Are you looking for a taxonomy project in entomology? Station Linné on Öland offers exciting opportunities at almost any level to those interested in insects! The positions on offer range from secondary school projects to bachelor and master thesis projects, but also appropriate PhD student positions and post docs can be eligible.

The Swedish Taxonomy Initiative (STI) supported inventory project “Swedish Malaise Trap Project” (SMTP) and "Swedish Insect Inventory Program" (SIIP) are run by Station Linné and has created a unique resource for insect studies with several tens of million of collected insects. The bulk of the material has been sorted into 330 taxonomic units. The results this far are astonishing! Since the start far more than 100 taxonomic experts around the globe have discovered hundreds of new species to science in the SMTP material and taxonomist working in the project are continuously discovering new species.  Almost all of the new discoveries belong to the two extremely diverse insect orders of Diptera and Hymenoptera.

New knowledge is also gained when it comes to insect species antecedently known to occur in the country; activity periods, environmental preferences and distribution ranges in Sweden just to mention a few. One secondary school student showed the abundance along with the environmental preferences of the four earwig species (Dermaptera) occurring in Sweden. Other bachelor or master students have chosen more demanding taxon to study, and nearly all of them have reported new and valuable knowledge of “their” group. Some students even got the opportunity to scientifically describe new species for science! Several of the students who have been doing thesies work or project courses at Station Linné have also continued in higher education. A number of students from Sweden and all around the world have also used insects from the SMTP in their PhD- or post doc studies.

Does this sounds tempting to you? If so, don't hesitate to contact us!
info@stationlinne.se
+46 (0)485 385 84 

Some few examples of projects conducted at SMTP and Station Linné (click on the picture to get the full pdf-version)