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Systematics of freshwater subterranean Malacostraca: Morphology, molecular systematics, and web-taxonomy

 Description of project: 

Subterranean Malacostraca are an ecologically important segment of freshwater fauna, providing over 1/3 of the total diversity of some groups. These animals have the potential to reveal evolutionary and ecological issues of a broad interest, as well as to take over a central role in groundwater conservation strategy. This potential remains nowadays unexplored due to confusing taxonomy with many cryptic species. The training project emphasizes main morphological and molecular techniques used in the systematics of selected groups (Amphipoda: Niphargidae, Isopoda: Asellidae, Decapoda: Atyidae) including phylogenetic analyses, species delimitation criteria and identification tools
Duration of training: 
4 weeks
Training period: 
To be discussed with mentor
Target Audience: 
MSc students, PhD students and early career researchers We encourage participants to bring their own samples
Practical experiences: 
- Techniques used for study of morphology (Amphipoda, Isopoda, Decapoda) - Use of online morpho-database (Amphipoda) - Molecular laboratory techniques (Amphipoda, Isopoda, Decapoda) - Analytic methods used for morphological and molecular data
Seminars: 
Species concepts, Criteria for species delimitation
Name of mentor / supervisor: 
Cene Fišer
Institution/Organisation: 
University of Ljubljana, Biotechnical Faculty
Unit/Department/Laboratory: 
Department of Biology, Group for zoology and speleobiology
Address: 
Večna pot 111, Ljubljana 1000, Slovenia