Projects
Rewiring of ecological networks under global change (Postdoc 2023-2026)
One of the main consequences of the current biodiversity crisis is the reorganization of pairwise interactions among species across ecological networks. This reorganization of ecological networks, termed ‘interaction rewiring’, can occur both via establishment of new interactions between species and/or changes in the strengths of the interactions between species. Rewiring can drastically alter nature’s functions and services to humanity. In this project, I quantify the potential of rewiring in mutualistic networks globally and predict how mutualistic networks might rewire under different global change scenarios. For example, I study the effect of rewiring on network stability in pollination and seed dispersal networks. The project is funded by Postdocpool / Emil Aaltosen Säätiö and Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Fellowship.
Effects of climate change on bird communities at large spatiotemporal scales (Postdoc 2019-2023)
Climate change affects biodiversity through responses of individual species, pairwise interactions, and entire communities. Community-level responses can reflect ecosystem responses to climate change and other anthropogenic pressures. Species’ distributions can track climate change to varying extents, thus changing the overall composition of local communities. In addition, climate change can alter communities via species’ interaction networks and linked dependencies on resources. In this project, I explore the processes that determine the extent and the direction of bird community changes under climate change in the northern hemisphere. For example, I study the effect of community diversity and variation in species’ traits on the shift of entire communities.
Understanding species interactions in the tropics: dynamics within and between trophic levels (PhD 2015-2019)
Knowledge on how and why species interact with each other can provide invaluable insight into understanding the many-fold effects that the anthropogenic pressures have on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. Multiple factors, including species’ co-occurrences, traits and the abiotic environment, define the pairwise interactions and the structure of interaction networks as a whole. My PhD project focused on interactions of tropical tree species and their seed dispersing mutualists in South America. Overall, co-occurrence and interaction patterns showed significant spatial variation across South America, indicating existence of large-scale biogeographical and anthropogenic processes.
Assessing the abundances and population sizes of deadwood inhabiting fungi in boreal forests (Internship 2015)
Despite the large coverage of boreal forest in the Nordic countries forest species are under continuous threat due to the synergistic effects of intensifying forestry, forest fragmentation and lack of deadwood. Deadwood inhabiting fungi are decomposers that maintain the deadwood continuum in boreal forests, but estimates of their abundances and population sizes are needed for reliable conservation and forest management. The continuity of the deadwood profile in terms of size and tree species is crucial for maintaining the resources of other trophic levels. In this project, I utilized long-term survey data of deadwood inhabiting fungi from a nature park in hemiboreal zone to study the deadwood continuum. Regardless of the strict conservation of the study area, following changes in the forestry management over time, there were clear gaps in the deadwood continuum, particularly for rare tree species. This can hamper conservation of deadwoord inhabiting fungi and other organisms that depend on diverse deadwood resource in the boral forests.
Detectability and conservation of moonworts (Botrychium) in Finland (MSc 2014-2015)
Vascular plants are often used as indicators to assess the endangerment status of a habitat. If a species is detected imperfectly it is difficult to assess its endangerment reliably, let alone its value as a habitat indicator. Moonworts (Botrychium) are used to assess the value of traditional rural biotopes in Finland because they are rare, endangered, and dependent on disturbed open habitats. In my MSc project, I assessed the detectability and its drivers as well as estimated the minimum population sizes of moonwort species in Central Finland using citizen science data. When accounting for detectability, the minimum population sizes were nearly ten-fold larger than the raw population sizes. The population sizes also covaried with sampling effort and legislation changes, indicating a strong influence of detectability on population estimates.
Winter activity of Arthropods (Arthropoda) in forest and meadow habitats (BSc 2013)
Both abiotic (e.g., snow depth and temperature) and biotic (e.g., species’ traits and interactions) factors influence communities of wintering arthropods. In my BSc projet, I studied the composition of wintering arthropod communities in three snow layers in two habitat types that differ in their abiotic conditions. Springtails were the most dominant taxon across the snow layers and habitat types. The forest habitat had higher richness than meadow habitats, when measuring the number of taxa, number of individuals and number of indicator taxa. The abiotic factors influenced strongly the observed communities, suggesting that climate change will drastically influence the composition of wintering arthropod communities.
