PhD opportunity - Statistical Modelling of Animal Communication History

We currently have an opening for a PhD scholarship on statistical methods to reconstruct the history of animal communication. This project lies at the interface between Machine Learning and Statistical modelling on the one hand, and Animal Linguistics on the other hand.

• Co-supervisors: Emmanuel Chemla (Linguist at ENS Paris) and Robin Ryder (Mathematician at Paris-Dauphine / Imperial College London)

• Host institution: the PhD student will be based at LSCP, École Normale Supérieure (centre of Paris)

• Funding: funding is provided by CNRS 80 Prime and takes the form of a standard French PhD contract for 36 months (net salary: approx 1800€/month). There are additional funds available for travel etc.

• Start date: ideally October 2024, with some flexibility.

• Summary of the project: Our aim is to understand how the repertoire of calls of closely related animal species has evolved over millions of years. To achieve this, we model several possible evolutionary scenarios, subject to different forces, and evaluate their plausibilities based on data and available knowledge about modern species. Using generative tools (simple ones in our case), this will even allow us to listen to the repertoires of ancestral species.

• Detailed project (pdf).

• How to apply: see instructions at the end of the detailed project.