How it all began...
This project brings together the career paths of seven international early-career scientists with interdisciplinary backgrounds. Once upon a time, we were all based in Abisko for our research. As we were spreading across Europe for new positions, we had a clear aim: continue to study how arctic tundra responds to environmental changes and continue to work together! We realized that in order to understand long-term changes in the Arctic we need long-term manipulative experiments, even if those experiments exceed common funding periods. So we threw caution into the wind and decided to go for it. In 2018 we began setting up a large and labour-intensive experiment to be able to work towards our common goal of assessing feedback between the arctic tundra and climate change. A few years later our experiment is thriving, and we are on our path to gain mechanistic understanding of fundamental above- and belowground ecosystem processes and to make data-based predictions for future responses to climate change.
The core team
EVELINE KRAB
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala, Sweden I am a soil ecologist interested in understanding how environmental changes affect soil organism communities and soil processes in cold ecosystems. I study to what extent these changes affect soil fauna, microbes and plants, and if (and how) altered interactions between these organisms affect carbon and nitrogen cycling. |
KONSTANTIN GAVAZOV
WSL, Lausanne, Switzerland I am a systems ecologist looking at the impacts of land use and climate change on natural mountain ecosystems in both temperate and arctic zones. These span subalpine grasslands, montane and boreal forests, treelines, tundra heath, ombrotrophic bogs and rich fens. I am particularly fascinated by biogeochemical interactions above- and belowground and often resort to isotopic tracers for their elucidation. My techniques of choice include field surveys, experimental manipulations and laboratory incubations. Within ALTER, I give a helping hand with plant identification, ecosystem CO2 exchange measurements and source contribution to belowground processes. |
MARIA VÄISÄNEN
University of Oulu, Finland I am a terrestrial field ecologist interested in herbivore-plant-soil interactions and their links with biogeochemical cycles. I study these interactions and links in tundra and taiga ecosystems often complemented with climate change manipulations and with fences that exclude reindeer grazing. Especially, I am interested in how the different mechanisms of grazing – trampling, excretion and defoliation – influence vegetation and soil. More recently, I have started to study the roles of stoichiometry and microbial community structure in driving tundra soil carbon cycling. Regarding methods, my expertise relies on soil properties and processes ranging from analysing the quality and quantity of soil carbon and nutrients to soil microbial activities, but I also use natural isotopes and ecosystem-level trace gas measurements. Within ALTER, my main inputs are microbial activities and plant ecophysiology. |
EMILY PICKERING-PEDERSEN
Umeå University, Sweden I am a plant and ecosystem ecologist, focusing on plant-nutrient dynamics in Arctic ecosystems. I am interested in how plants respond to climate change, and how the complex interactions between plants, microorganisms, nutrient cycling, carbon turnover and seasonality may lead to ecosystem change and climate feedbacks. I explore the linkages between above- and belowground processes across seasons, including resource partitioning, plant-plant and plant-microbe competition for nutrients, and how this might shape changes in plant species community composition. Within ALTER, I contribute to running the long-term experiment, organising and conducting fieldwork, and supervising students, interns and field assistants. |
SIGNE LETT
University of Copenhagen, Denmark I am a terrestrial ecologist with a special interest in the functional role of mosses. My research focuses on tundra ecosystems, where mosses are a particularly important component. I investigate the consequences of moss responses to climate change for ecosystem C and N cycling and for other ecosystem components such as competition with vascular plants. I work in the interface between ecosystem and community ecology and have a strong background in experimental field-based methods. See more at my personal webpage. Within the ALTER project, I focus on plant responses and interactions. I am interested in how we as a diverse and dynamic group can ensure optimal workflow through e.g., efficient meetings and data management. |
SYLVAIN MONTEUX
Tromsø Museum - UiT The Arctic University of Norway My research focuses on Arctic soil systems, with an emphasis on how abiotic (e.g. freezing and permafrost) and biotic (e.g. rhizosphere and mesofauna) factors affect their functioning through altering microbial communities. Elucidating how microbial communities control soil functioning is an important step to move from an empirical to a mechanistic understanding of the Arctic climate change feedback and improve predictions of future C and N cycling. I aim to facilitate this transition through mechanism-oriented studies, combining laboratory and field experiments with modelling efforts. Within ALTER, my main inputs target DNA-based approaches and aspects of data management and reproducibility. |
Our students
HENRIKE LANGE
Bachelor student and intern in 2021. Henrike worked on how decomposition rates are influenced by vegetation cover and mycorrhizae. |
ANIKA MAYR
Bachelor student and intern in 2021. Anika worked on the influence of the mycorrhizal status on growth-response to neighbour removal in an arctic heath tundra community. |
PAUL SCHULZ
Intern in 2020 & field assistant in 2021. Bachelor student in 2020/2021 with the thesis topic "Influence of Vegetation Cover and Mycorrhizal Types on Litter Decomposition in Arctic Heath Vegetation Soil – A Tea Bag Study". |
LEAH KIRCHHOFF
Master student in 2021 with the thesis topic "Root endophytes and soil fungal communities in a sub-Arctic mycorrhizal plant manipulation experiment". |
MARGAUX CHADANSON
intern in 2019 |