Environmental Surveillance & Wildlife Adaptation

Organization
U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)
Reference Code
DOE-MSIPP-18-1-LANL
How to Apply

A complete application must include the following to be considered:

  • Completion of all required fields in the application and successful application submission
  • Undergraduate or graduate transcripts as appropriate
  • Two recommendations

If you have questions, send an email to Kerri Fomby at kerri.fomby@orau.org. Please include the reference code for this opportunity in your email.

For Technical information, contact Cassandra Casperson at casperson@lanl.gov.

Application Deadline
1/12/2018 11:59:00 PM Eastern Time Zone
Description

The Minority Serving Institutions Partnership Program (MSIPP) Internships is a new program to promote the education and development of the next generation workforce in critical science, engineering, technology, and math (STEM) related disciplines that complement current and future missions of DOE national laboratories.  The MSIPP Internship program is designed to provide an enhanced training environment for next generation scientists and engineers by exposing them to research challenges unique to our industry. 

MSIPP Interns will be given the opportunity to complete Summer Internships aligned with ongoing U.S. Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management (DOE-EM) research under the direction of a host national laboratory.  The internship will be performed at the host national laboratory, utilizing their facilities and equipment under the guidance of a research staff member.

Minority Serving Institutions are institutions of higher education enrolling populations with significant percentages of undergraduate minority students. 

Project: This project will study the changes in arthropod-borne diseases with respect to climate pressures and environmental conditions in a migratory bird population and in mosquitoes over a latitudinal gradient. Using a long-term population study site of a cavity-nesting bird, the western bluebird (Sialia mexicana), in the southern Rocky Mountains (New Mexico) in combination with additional study sites located along the range of the Rocky Mountains (Colorado, Wyoming, Montana) (Fig. 1), we will explore the relative impacts of these environmental variables on the dynamics of arthropod borne diseases. We will use statistical models to estimate correlations between changes in abiotic and biotic factors related to climate and mosquito-borne disease in the system, allowing for nonlinear responses. We will then adapt mechanistic disease and population dynamics models to our system, informing parameters with the statistical analysis, allowing for prediction of system states under future climate regimes and novel fusion of mechanistic and statistical models that leverages strengths of both approaches. We will leverage the genomic expertise at LANL measure the metagenome and Plasmodium in mosquitoes at the different latitudes. We will use an abundant cavity-nesting species, the western bluebird (Sialia mexicana) and will model the demographics and dynamics of this population and the relationship to pathogens found in mosquito populations along a latitudinal gradient of the Rocky Mountains.

We will leverage a long-term monitoring project on cavity-nesting birds in New Mexico and to compare to three northern Rocky Mountain populations and analyze past Plasmodium prevalence in the southern population over the last 20 years. Environmental factors will vary between the four sites, and we predict that infection status will vary widely with them. This monitoring is novel in that prevalence in both birds and mosquitoes as well as seroprevalence of Plasmodium will measured. We will use Plasmodium data to examine competing hypotheses regarding the impact of these climate-driven stressors on known mosquito borne diseases and other pathogens collected in mosquitoes.

Location: This internship will be located at Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Salary: Selected candidate will be compensated by either a stipend or salary, and may include one round trip domestic travel to and from the host laboratory. Stipends and salaries will be commensurate with cost of living at the location of the host laboratory. Housing information will be provided to interns prior to arrival at the host laboratory, and will vary from lab to lab.

Application Deadline: January 12, 2018

Expected Start Date:  The program is 10 weeks in duration, starting May 21, 2018. Start date is flexible based on laboratory and candidate availability.

Qualifications

Eligible applicants must:

  • Be a citizen of the United States,

  • Be at least 18 years of age,

  • Currently enrolled as a full-time undergraduate or graduate student at an accredited Minority Serving Institution, http://orise.orau.gov/msipp/documents/approved-msi-school-list.pdf,

  • Working toward a science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM) degree,

  • Have an undergraduate or graduate cumulative minimum Grade Point Average (GPA) of 3.0 on a 4.0 scale, and

  • Pass a drug test upon selection to participate in the MSIPP

    *The process and timing for drug testing varies from lab to lab.  Use of Marijuana/Cannabis or its derivatives if prescribed is legal in some states.  However, having these drugs in your system is NOT legal at United States Federal Contractor sites and National Laboratories. 

Required Knowledge, Skills, Work Experience, and Education

Successful candidates will:

  • Be a current undergraduate or graduate student pursuing a degree in a biological or environmental science discipline, computer science, mathematics, or related field.

Desired Knowledge, Skills, Work Experience, and Education

It is desirable for the candidate to have:

Work will entail field work, minimal laboratory work, and statistical analysis.  All interns will be trained on all specific skills and capabilities. The capability to work in outdoor conditions is required. Interests to include: statistics, wildlife, infectious disease, epidemiology and environmental change. General computer skills required and other favorable skills would include: experience with statistics and R programming (but not limited to), general office computer skills, experience with bioinformatics and working with metagenomic sequence data. 

Eligibility Requirements
  • Citizenship: U.S. Citizen Only
  • Degree: Currently pursuing a Bachelor's Degree or Master's Degree.
  • Overall GPA: 3.00
  • Discipline(s):
    • Computer, Information, and Data Sciences (16 )
    • Earth and Geosciences (21 )
    • Environmental and Marine Sciences (14 )
    • Life Health and Medical Sciences (45 )
    • Mathematics and Statistics (10 )
Affirmation

I certify that I am at least 18 years of age and a US citizen, and am currently enrolled as a student in a degree seeking undergraduate or graduate program in a STEM field at an accredited Minority Serving Institution (MSI).