Prospective Students

UCF is one of the fastest growing universities in the country. Located in Orlando, FL, the fifth fastest growing metropolitan area in the nation, the university is within an hour drive of habitats that range from rivers, lakes, estuaries and freshwater marshes to pine flatwoods, dry prairies, mixed hardwood forests and mangroves. There is a wide diversity of research interests within the department and within the GAMES Lab itself. Within our lab, current research involves mapping forest canopy structure with LiDAR, developing a model for wetland valuation, patch connectivity, climate limitations on the distribution of mangroves and climate change biology. The focus of other department labs, with which we often collaborate, include but aren’t limited to sea turtle biology, invasive exotic species, reproductive behavior of cape squirrels, the Florida grasshopper sparrow, and population viability assessment of threatened and endangered species.

I am interested in self-motivated students with past research experience. I have room for one or two students to begin in Fall 2008. Students will work with me to develop an independent research project that is unique, innovative, and fits the individual student’s professional goals. I support students with both my time and, if available and relevant to the student’s interests, grant support. However, I expect my students to also secure additional funding through their own proposals.

Students interested in joining the lab should take a look through the research section of this webpage and read some of the papers and presented posters to assess if our interests are compatible with their individual research goals. I prefer to accept students with interests in landscape ecology, GIS, remote sensing, and ecological modeling. However, I am willing to entertain unusual research projects that may lie outside these fields. I do not expect incoming students to have a prepared research topic, but they should have some idea about the type questions that interest them. All eligible Ph. D. students should also apply for an NSF graduate research fellowship or a comparable source of funding. There are limited teaching assistantships through the department.

If you are still interested in being a part of this lab after reading through all this information, contact should be made for an interview between four and eight months prior to the application deadline. You can contact me at jweisham@mail.ucf.edu.