Short cv

Career

2018- . . .  – Postdoctoral fellow, Centre of Excellence Plants and Ecosystems, University of Antwerp, Belgium
2013-2018 – PhD-studies, Centre of Excellence Plants and Ecosystems, University of Antwerp, Belgium
2008-2013 – Bachelors and masters studies, Ecology and Environment, University of Antwerp, Belgium

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2017- . . . – MIREN (Mountain Invasion Research Network): Co-coordinator.
2015- . . . – MIREN (Mountain Invasion Research Network): Steering Committee.

Publications

As a scientist, my main goal lies in the contributions to the world’s knowledge; a goal most notoriously achieved through the publication of scientific papers. I currently published 9 peer-reviewed papers in international scientific journals, and I have 2 papers under review and 1 popular science publications. For a list of all of them up till now, I gladly refer you to my profile on Google Scholar, for a summary of the conclusions, visit my Science-page, and for a list of blogs on the papers, visit the paper-posts page.

Citation statistics (as of 7/05/2018): ISI Web of Science: 39 citations, H-index = 5; Google Scholar: 72 citations, H-index = 5; ResearchGate: score = 18.80, 2014 reads.

Student projects

PhD-projects

Ronja – 2018-… –  Highways up the mountains? – Trails as facilitators for redistribution of plant species in mountain areas.
Charly – 2017-… – Cities: hotspots for future biological invasions?

Student projects

Robin – masters thesis 2019 – Testing a thermometer of the past; bacterial communities and chemical fossils along a subarctic elevation gradient.
Bram – masters thesis 2019 – Brussels’ urban heat island: a hotspot for future plant invasions.
Amélie – masters thesis 2018 – plant species distribution shifts along mountain roads: microclimate.
Maria-Rose – masters thesis 2018 – plant species distribution shifts along mountain roads over time.
Jan – masters thesis 2018 – plant and mycorrhizal distribution shifts along mountain roads.
Sebastien – masters thesis 2017 – drivers of plant invasion in mountains: disturbance and trails.
Sharissa – masters thesis 2017 – microclimate explains patters of recolonisation in disturbed vegetation.
Nina – masters thesis 2016 – including roads into species distribution models of non-native plant invaders.
Gilles – masters thesis 2016 – drivers of plant invasion in mountains: microclimate and disturbance.
Charly – masters thesis 2015 – limits to the invasibility of sub(ant)arctic mountain vegetation and the effects of microclimate.
Pablo – 2015 – the combined effect of invading pine trees and cushion plants on understory alien species along a Patagonian steppe road.
Arne – masters thesis 2015 – limits to the invasibility of subarctic mountain vegetation.
Niels – masters project 2015 – abiotic en biotic microvariation within gaps and their effect on winter survival of gap colonisers.
Lotte and Kevin – bachelors thesis 2015 – microscale effects of savannah trees on understory diverity.

Teaching

Cold stress in plants – Plant Ecology for the masters in Biology, Ecology and Environment, University of Antwerp (2013, 2015-present).
Fluorescence as a measure of plant stress – Plant Ecology for the masters in Biology, Ecology and Environment, University of Antwerp (2013-present).
Forest types – Ecosystem types for the Bachelors in Biology, University of Antwerp (2014-present).

 

Awards and achievements

March 2018 – Short-listed for the Ecography Award for Excellence in Ecology and Evolution (the E4-Award).
March 2018 – W.S. Cooper Award from the Ecological Society of America for the paper “Disturbance is the key to plant invasions in cold environments”. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113:14061–14066.
January 2018 – INTERACT Travel Grant
March 2017 – INTERACT Travel Grant
October 2015 – finalist of  ‘Man and Mountain’ – Perth III Mountains of Our Future Earth photography contest
June 2014 – FWO PhD fellowship (4 years)
January 2014 – INTERACT Travel Grant
June 2013 – ActUA student award

Scientific blogs

2017 – present – globalchangeecology.blog, the blog platform of the Global Change Ecology Centre of the University of Antwerp.
2017 – present – EOS wetenschap
2015 – present – The Arctic Research blog from INTERACT.
2015 – present – MRI, the Mountain Research Initiative, blog coordinator for MIREN.
2015 – 2017- Scilogs, the blog platform of EOS.
2015 – latinamericanscience.org for the South-American part.
2015 – Biodiverse Perspectives, a joint blogging effort of graduate students.