The 3D lab

Between old stones

Posted on June 11, 2014 by lembrechtsjonas

It is an old village, a valley filled with old stones and castles in the heart of France.

It might seem outdated and dead, but the old stony walls are blooming with flowers.

The workshop that is going on overlooking these old stones is everything but old. Leading scientists from all over the world in the field of climate change biology gathered here to refine the focus of our questions: we should get away from the large-scale averages of climate and climate change that are currently used. We should bring down the scale to the level that is really experienced by the organisms: meters, or even centimeters.

Only then, we can find reliable predictions of what the future will bring us. Only then, we might find ways to understand how plants and animals really experience the shifts in their environment.

A major challenge, but the old walls of the Loire castles serve as witnesses of the power of a gathering of great scientists: together, we will find the answers we are looking for. And that is exactly why we are here.

Posted in France, General | Tagged Castles, climate change, Ecology, France, Heteroclim, Loches, Loire, Photography, Ruines, Science, Tours | 4 Comments

Extreme

Posted on June 8, 2014 by lembrechtsjonas

Last night brought extreme weather conditions to Belgium. After a hot summer day, hailstorms swept over the country, dropping hail stones of several centimeters.

The storm resulted in a lot of economical, agricultural and natural damage, although it lasted not longer than fifteen minutes. Those fifteen minutes were however enough for the hailstones to perforate windows and greenhouses and many other unprotected things all over the country.

Such hail storms provide a good example of temporal variation in microclimate. I have been focussing on its spatial counterpart, which gives different climate over a distance of a few centimeters or meters. But it is not only on a spatial scale that we can see deviations from the average climate. Over time, extreme weather conditions may happen, that may differ a lot from the average Those extremes, like hail storms, long heat waves or large floodings, may be much more limiting for plant growth than the average climate ever will.

Climate change will most likely bring us more of these extreme weather events in the future. So even if the average climate would not change too drastically, those higher chance of extremes will still strongly influence species survival and distributions.

I have been focussing my research a lot on the spatial variation in microclimates, but this huge hail storm made me realize that the temporal variation can not be ignored. I did not have the opportunity to check what the hailstones did to my disturbance experiment, but it made me at least realize that all these extreme events should be taken into account to understand the results.

Posted in Belgium | Tagged Belgium, Extreme, Extreme weather, Hagel in België, Hail, Hail storm, Microclimate, Storm, Weather | 3 Comments

Why science brings me to France

Posted on June 6, 2014 by lembrechtsjonas

Science is not something you do on your own. It may sometimes look like that if you count all the lonely hours behind the computer, but the best results will always be reached together with others. This collegial help manifests itself on a variety of levels: it can range from a quick question to the colleagues sharing my office, over the highly valuable discussions with and input from my supervisors, to international collaborations to compile and process global databases.

Provence

It is extremely important to work on an extended scientific network. In my situation as an early career ecologist, I can climb to unexpected heights by just asking the help from people that have many more years of experience. Other scientists hand over awesome ideas for new research directions, fresh views on problems you were already struggling with forever, or a background that gives them crucial expertise you do not (yet) have on your own.

Picardie

With that philosophy in mind, I will travel to France, next week. I got the (highly appreciated) opportunity to represent my supervisor at a scientific workshop in Loches, in the Loire region. I am preparing for 3 days of interaction with other scientists working on the same subjects as I am. Such things provide an incredible learning experience!

Corsica

Moreover, some of the ‘big names’ in my discipline will be there to give presentations! The benefits of those encounters are simply endless, trust me.

Picardie

Additional advantage: the workshop will bring me to the medieval city of Loches in a picturesque part of France where I have never been before! Visits to France are always a nice experience, which I try to prove with pictures from previous visits to the country.

Provence

Pas-de-Calais

Posted in France | Tagged Corsica, France, Networking, PhD, Photography, Picardie, Provence, Science, Tours, Workshop, World | 3 Comments

Nature on walking distance

Posted on June 2, 2014 by lembrechtsjonas

To compensate for all the work behind the computer the last few weeks, I am happy with every minute in free nature.

A pine cone

I do not need to go very far, all places with sun and living things can make me happy.

A clumsy baby jackdaw, not sure at all about how to use its wings

This post tries to honor this local nature, that always manages to give me a good mood to go to work.

A good paw hygiene is essential for the big hunter

Soon enough I will return to science and travel, but for now I stay in the garden.

The beautiful detailed view of horsetail

The beautiful detailed view of a horsetail

In Flanders fields, poppies are the sign of summer

Posted in Belgium | Tagged Belgium, Birds, Cat, City adventures, Garden, Nature, Photography, Walking | 5 Comments

The magic of modeling

Posted on May 30, 2014 by lembrechtsjonas

Not all the work in my PhD is as photogenic as it might have looked from my posts here. A significant part of it even looks a lot more like a normal desk job, with a lot of computer work.

But this computer work is not at all less exciting than all the photogenic parts, and many of the results may be even more valuable for my research than those from the time I spend outside.

At the moment, a big part of my time goes to the development of a theoretical model of plant invasion in vegetation gaps.

With the help of some long-lost high-school analytical equations, a whole bunch of fantastic modeling tricks and skills learned from strangers on the internet and the endless trial-and-error inherent to modeling, an impression of the real world is slowly brought to life on my computer screen. Without all the noise.

And that is the major advantage of this approach. You can predict highly complicated patterns and processes that would otherwise stay out of sight in nature, because of the inconvenience created by the noise that results from the interaction of thousands of real-time changing factors. Looking for proof in nature becomes a lot easier if the models first tell you what exactly to look for.

It’s a kind of magic, only a quiet time-consuming one, but the results will be not less spectacular.

Posted in Belgium, The research | Tagged Analytical geometry, Biology, Computer science, Computers, Ecology, Invasion, Mathematics, Modeling, PhD, Predictions, R, Science | 4 Comments

California!

Posted on May 27, 2014 by lembrechtsjonas

All my traveling and working abroad really starts to pay off! I will present the results of my first paper from Northern Scandinavia on the biggest ecology congress there is: the ESA conference in Sacramento, California, in August this year!

This opportunity will create a big chance to make some publicity for my scientific results and to network with other mountain ecologists and invasion specialists from all over the world. It will make my work again that little bit more global.

It will also add another country to my list! You can find a menu on my blog with all the countries where I have been writing about (click on the menu with the title ‘on top of the world‘). This conference-opportunity adds the USA to a list that at the moment contains Chile, Lapland, Belgium, Tanzania, Tenerife and Luxembourg.

So many places, so many opportunities to expand my scientific knowledge and so many chances to take pictures. The pictures in this post give a broad impression of the wide variety of landscapes and environments I have seen the past year.

I end my post by asking for help from all the American readers of my blog. If I have a couple of days in Sacramento to visit the area, what are the places I definitily have to see? Please leave some comments below, and I will try to go there and document my trip with awesome photographs!