Projects

Climate change affects not only air temperature and precipitation, but also our streams and rivers: water temperature is rising, river flow characteristics are changing, oxygen concentration is sinking, while nutrient concentrations increase. This is not without consequence for the plants and animals living in freshwaters.

Invasion biology has addressed or even solved several key questions about biological invasions, but the central issue of long-term effects of invasive species has remained critically unexplored. Several case studies exist about long-term population dynamics of invasive species and their impacts, but a general synthesis or understanding is currently lacking. This knowledge gap is critical, as long-term shifts in invader population densities and traits are likely and may have large consequences of ecological and economic interest. This project aims to narrow the knowledge gap.

AQUACROSS is a Horizon 2020 project which aims to support EU efforts to protect aquatic biodiversity and ensure the provision of aquatic ecosystem services. As such, AQUACROSS seeks to advance knowledge and application of ecosystem-based management for aquatic ecosystems to support the timely achievement of the EU 2020 Biodiversity Strategy targets.   

A new EU regulation to address invasive species entered into force at the beginning of 2015. IGB is involved in a project run by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN) in which a method is being further developed to identify invasive species that are of particular concern in Germany in the context of this EU regulation.

Skyglow, the diffuse illumination of the night sky by artificial light, has never before been experienced during evolutionary history. Together with another feature of global change – the brownification of lakes caused by humic substances – skyglow disrupts the current light conditions in lake ecosystems. We will elucidate the ecological consequences of these phenomena and the mechanisms underlying them.

Comparing phenotypic plasticity in bacterial prey traits and ecological consequences by using specialist vs. generalist strains and organic aggregates as model systems.

BIBS is a BMBF project for biodiversity data collection and synthesis in Germany

Eutrophication is a worldwide environmental problem accelerated by global warming, affecting the stability of aquatic ecosystems and having long-lasting consequences. In this project we investigate if and how eutrophication affects two interacting evolutionary processes: disease spread and interspecific hybridization.