Research Associate

We have an exciting opportunity for a Research Associate to make a leading contribution to an ongoing six-year project (“Synergy-Plague. Reconstructing the environmental, biological, and societal drivers of plague outbreaks in Eurasia between 1300 and 1900 CE”; https://www.synergy-plague.org/ ), working with Principal Investigator, Professor Philip Slavin (University of Stirling) and Leading Collaborator, Professor Samuel Cohn (University of Glasgow). The successful applicant will be based at the University of Glasgow and will be co-supervised by Professor Cohn and Professor Slavin.

The ERC Synargy-Plague Synergy project involves an international interdisciplinary team led by four PIs: Professors Slavin, Nils Stenseth, Ulf Büntgen and Florent Sebbane. The main objective of the project is to expand our understanding of the ecologies and mechanisms of plague transmission during the Second Pandemic over Eurasia and North Africa. The project is strongly interdisciplinary in character, involving a team of epidemiological modelling (Stenseth), palaeo-climatology (Büntgen), plague biology (Sebanne) and environmental history (Slavin). The project has embarked on its second year.

We are presently exploring geographic regions yet to receive their deserved scholarly attention. These include former Venetian and Genoese colonies (collectively referred to as ‘Romania’) in the western Balkans, Pelopenese, Crete, Cyprus, Crimea, Anatolia and today’s Southern Russia. In addition, we are interested in taking advantage of Venetian and Genoese notarial and commercial records in some Middle Eastern hubs (including Cairo and Damascus). The bulk of  these records are preserved in the Venetian and Genoese archives (mostly, in the Archivio di Stato di Venezia and Archivio di Stato di Genova), in addition to a series of Croatian and Montenegrin archives (Dubrovnik, Kotor etc).

The successful Research Associate will be involved collecting, photographing, transcribing, collating data related to plague outbreaks from the archives in question, inputting these into an ongoing global database of plague outbreaks, and will be involved in data analysis. The successful candidate will begin research with Venetian materials (months 1-12) and should progress to Genoese, Croatian and Montenegrin archives in months 13-36.

For informal enquiries, please contact Professor Samuel Cohn, Samuel.cohn@glasgow.ac.uk or Professor Philip Slavin, Philip.slavin@stir.ac.uk

This post is full time with funding available for up to 36 months.

For more information on the role, the project, and to apply online:

https://www.jobs.gla.ac.uk/job/research-associate-5839328

Closing date: 7 April 2026 @23:45

We believe that we can only reach our full potential through the talents of all. Equality, diversity and inclusion are at the heart of our values. Applications are particularly welcome from across our communities and in particular people from the Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) community, and other protected characteristics who are under-represented within the University. Read more on how the University promotes and embeds all aspects of equality and diversity within our community https://www.gla.ac.uk/myglasgow/humanresources/equalitydiversity/.

We endorse the principles of Athena Swan https://www.gla.ac.uk/myglasgow/humanresources/equalitydiversity/athenaswan/ and hold bronze, silver and gold awards across the University.

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