About me
Background
I am a community ecologist, currently working as Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions postdoctoral fellow at Center for Ecological Dynamics in a Novel Biosphere (ECONOVO) with Alejandro Ordonez. Previously, I worked as a postdoc in Helsinki Lab of Ornithology led by Aleksi Lehikoinen. I did my PhD at the Centre for Biodiversity Dynamics at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in 2015-2019. Before that I did my BSc and MSc at University of Jyväskylä and majored in ecology and evolutionary biology while also studying pedagogics, history and statistics.
In addition to my main projects, I participate in scientific society work. Since 2023, I’m a board member of Society for Conservation Biology Europe Region. In the board, I chair the Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice Committee as well as organize seminars and conferences and update the society’s social media accounts together with other board members. I’m also on the editorial board of a journal owned by the Ecological Society of America, Ecological Monographs, that I joined in 2024 as a Subject-Matter-Editor.
Research interests
Ecological communities consist of different species that interact directly and indirectly with each other. The overarching theme of my research is understanding what makes species’ communities as they are and how they will change under the ever-intensifying anthropogenic pressures. In my research, I focus on the biodiversity trends at large spatial and temporal scales and on a wide range of taxa. I’m broadly interested in theoretical ecology, species’ interactions, biogeography, species’ traits, global change drivers, species distribution modelling, and related to all these: handling large datasets. For more details of past and ongoing research, see ‘projects’.
Commitment to increasing diversity, equity and inclusion in research
Both in my work and life outside the office, I do my best to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion. In my roles in the Society for Conservation Biology’s Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice (DEIJ) Committees in Europe and globally, I have the opportunity to push scientific practices to a more inclusive and just direction. For example, I am currently leading a group in writing guidelines for more inclusive and just conservation field work. I have taken part in organizing conferences, for which I have implemented a number of DEIJ-related measures from childcare for parents to mentoring events for early career scientists. At Aarhus University, I am a member of the Biology Department’s Diversity Committee where I especially focus on updating the recruitment process to be more inclusive. In the past, I have also been a member of equality committee at Biology Department, NTNU (Norway). In my everyday work, I do my best to support colleagues from underrepresented backgrounds, suggest seminar presenters, reviewers and collaborators from diverse background, and offer scientific justifications for taking steps towards inclusion in the planning of new activities in the department.
Personal interests
Despite (or because of) the fact that most of my work requires sitting in front of a computer, I love spending time in nature, both in remote national parks and in the urban forests. I take my mind off work by playing football, taking care of houseplants, pub quizzing and learning Portuguese.
