Giulio Valentino Dalla Riva

Dear Prof. Petchey,

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I am applying for a PostDoc position in the project of Predictive Ecology. I am a biomathematics PhD student working with Mike Steel and Daniel B. Stouffer at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand. I’ll be available from the start of 2016.

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I have a strong mathematical background and an eager interest in ecology. During my PhD, I have developed mathematical tools to explore the interplay between of ecological and evolutionary processes in food webs. Doing this, I could grow my programming competence and my experience in complex networks, as well as my biological understanding. I believe in the goals of the Predictive Ecology research project: increasing the predictive ability of ecology is both urgently needed for facing the environmental crisis we are living and important for testing our scientific theories.

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In the project, I will contribute to the analytical abilities of the research group, provide a diverse point of view, and further develop my skills.

Influential papers

Tilman, D. (2000). Causes, consequences and ethics of biodiversity. Nature, 405(6783), 208-211
I spent most of my childhood hiking mountains or climbing trees. I had the gut feeling that preserving nature was our duty. Reading Tilman’ paper during my Master Degree, I could clearly understand why we should care about biodiversity and how can science help us.

May, R. M. (1972). Will a large complex system be stable?. Nature, 238, 413-414.
My Bachelor is in pure maths. I never considered biology really interesting. Alas!, I was wrong! This paper showed me how challenging is the study of ecosystems. May’s work in complexity is part of the reason I’m a biomathematician.

Nee, S., \& May, R. M. (1997). Extinction and the loss of evolutionary history. Science, 278(5338), 692-694.
This paper, which I read at the beginning of my PhD, is flawed: the random tree model they use is largely unrealistic. However, it raised a question which still motivates our research efforts. Sometimes, the right question is as important as an answer. And science must be a collective, self-correcting endeavour.

Thank you for the your precious time and consideration. I look forward to hear from you.

Best regards,

Giulio Valentino Dalla Riva

gvd16@uclive.ac.nz • +64-3-364-2987 ext 4869
Biomathematics Research Centre University of Canterbury Christchurch, New Zealand