Stay Connected to Be Diverse!

Plankton biodiversity is crucial for the functioning of aquatic ecosystems, influencing nutrient cycling, food web dynamics, and carbon storage. Global change and habitat destruction disrupt these ecosystems, reducing species diversity and ecosystem resilience. Connectivity between aquatic habitats supports biodiversity by enabling species migration, genetic diversity, and recovery from disturbances.

The combined impact of low temperatures and shifting phosphorus availability on the competitive ability of cyanobacteria.

In freshwater systems, cyanobacteria are strong competitors under enhanced temperature and eutrophic conditions. Understanding their adaptive and evolutionary potential to multiple environmental states allows us to accurately predict their response to future conditions. To better understand if the combined impacts of temperature and nutrient limitation could suppress the cyanobacterial blooms, a single strain of Microcystis aeruginosa was inoculated into natural phytoplankton communities with different nutrient conditions: oligotrophic, eutrophic and eutrophic with the addition of bentophos.

Trophic switches in pelagic systems.

Ecological studies need experimentation to test concepts and to disentangle causality in community dynamics. While simple models have given substantial insights into population and community dynamics, recent ecological concepts become increasingly complex. The globally important pelagic food web dynamics are well suited to test complex ecological concepts.

Functional group richness: implications of biodiversity for light use and lipid yield in microalgae.

Currently, very few studies address the relationship between diversity and biomass/lipid production in primary producer communities for biofuel production. Basic studies on the growth of microalgal communities, however, provide evidence of a positive relationship between diversity and biomass production. Recent studies have also shown that positive diversity-productivity relationships are related to an increase in the efficiency of light use by diverse microalgal communities.