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Biodiversiteit en natuurontwikkeling |
Sinds 1995 hebben we een proefveld waar biodiversiteitbehandelingen zijn uitgevoerd. Zo zijn er op een uit productie genomen landbouwgrond in het natuurgebied Planken Wambuis bij Ede delen met lage en hoge diversiteit aan plantensoorten, delen waar natuurlijke successie vanaf het begin ongestoord...Read more |
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Biological control improvement: luring hyperparasitoids away from sweet pepper crops |
Biological control, the use of insect parasitoids to reduce the population of insect pests, is the most environmentally safe and cost-effective pest-management method currently available. However, hyperparasitoids (parasitoids of parasitoids) represent a major constraint for biocontrol...Read more |
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Boosting the efficacy of biological control agents of citrus mealybugs through olfactory conditioning |
Citruswolluis vormt wereldwijd een lastig te bestrijden plaag. Voor een betere biologische bestrijding moet de zoekefficiëntie van sluipwespen worden verbeterd. Om plaaginsecten te vinden, gebruiken sluipwespen plantengeuren die het gewas na een plaagaanval afscheidt. Sluipwespen kunnen goed leren...Read more |
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Carbon storage traits in soil microbiology |
Soil microbial metabolism is important for global carbon cycling. Recent work has shown that soil microbes not only use carbon for growth and energy, but also store carbon in compounds analogous to fat reserves in animals. We aim to understand the role of storage physiology for soil microbial life...Read more |
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Comparing insect communities on native Dutch wild mustard plants over a growing season |
Host-plant suitability and quality for herbivore (and possibly natural enemy) development is determined by the presence of sufficient levels of nutrients and concentrations of adverse metabolites such as specific secondary plant compounds and digestibility reducers. In nature, these characteristics...Read more |
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De rol van secundaire plantenstoffen in de smalle weegbree in resistentie tegen pathogenen en herbivoren |
Hieronder volgt algemene informatie over eerdere studentenprojecten. Een update is op te vragen bij begeleider Arjen Biere. Secundaire plantenstoffen kunnen een rol spelen bij afweer tegen zowel herbivoren als fytopathogene schimmels. In natuurlijke populaties wordt vaak een grote mate van...Read more |
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Ecologisch modelleren plantendiversiteit |
Hieronder volgt algemene informatie over eerdere studentenprojecten. Een update kan opgevraagd worden bij begeleider Wim van der Putten. Wil je een bijdrage leveren aan het verklaren van plantendiversiteit? Waarom zijn sommige soorten dominant en andere zo zeldzaam? Er zijn veel theorieën die...Read more |
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Ecologische en evolutionaire interacties tussen waardplant, pathogene schimmel, en herbivoor insect: aanpassingen in een complexe wereld |
Hieronder volgt algemene info over eerdere studentenprojecten. Een update kan je aanvragen bij begeleider Arjen Biere. Een groot deel van de potentiële reproductie van planten in natuurlijke populaties gaat verloren door toedoen van pathogenen en herbivoren. Twee anjerachtigen, Silene alba en S...Read more |
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Effects of nutrient addition and large herbivore grazing on insect communities in grassland ecosystems |
Grassland host a high diversity of insects, which comprise about half of earth's macroscopic biodiversity and maintain important ecosystem services. Nutrient availability and mammalian herbivory are two key drivers of insect abundance and diversity in grassland ecosystems. However, how these...Read more |
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Emerging trends in Ecological Meta-analysis with the increased availability of datasets |
NIOO is one of the largest institutes within the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW). With four departments – Animal, Aquatic, Microbial, and Terrestrial Ecology – NIOO leads top-quality interdisciplinary research. NIOO is situated opposite the Wageningen UR campus. See more at...Read more |
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Home Sweet Home: the role of specialized organisms in litter decomposition |
We are looking for a motivated MSc student to carry out a 6-month internship or research project on the decomposition of plant litter. Decomposition is a key process in ecosystems worldwide, as the breakdown of plant litter drives soil resource availability, and hence is a crucial factor for...Read more |
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How do soil micro-organisms affect the chances of woodland expansions during water pulses? |
Woodland expansion in arid environments occurs episodically during wet years. Recent research indicates that tree seedling growth rate and survival is crucial to explain the differences across ecosystems and that soil microorganisms likely play a crucial role. One of the main hypotheses to be...Read more |
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Improving biological control in greenhouses: luring hyperparasitoids away from sweet pepper crops |
Biological control, the use of insect parasitoids to reduce the population of insect pests, is the most environmentally safe and cost-effective pest-management method currently available. However, hyperparasitoids (parasitoids of parasitoids) represent a major constraint for biocontrol...Read more |
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Invertebrates in dung of large herbivores: consequences of rewilding |
Large herbivores are increasingly being reintroduced in nature reserves in Europe: so-called 'rewilding'. These projects offer great possibilities to study the impact of large herbivores on ecosystem structure, diversity and functioning. Large vertebrate herbivores have a key impact on carbon and...Read more |
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Investigating insect herbivore impacts on plant soil-feedbacks through changes to litter quality |
Plants alter the biotic and abiotic components of the soil, which can alter the performance of plants of the same or different species that subsequently grow in the soil. Such processes are called plant-soil feedbacks. Much recent attention has been given to plant-soil feedbacks, but most studies...Read more |
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Lifetime reproductive success in two secondary hyperparasitoid wasps, Lysibia nana and Gelis agilis |
General information on earlier student projects below - updates with supervisor Jeff Harvey! Hyperparasitoids are insects that develop on, or in another parasitoid species. Secondary hyperparasitoids attack primary parasitoid hosts (usually their cocoons) that have already emerged from the...Read more |
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Manipulating your victim: the adaptive significance of host usurpation by the endoparasitoids Cotesia glomerata and Cotesia congregata |
General information on earlier student projects below - updates with supervisor Jeff Harvey! Parasitoid wasps are known to exhibit two strategies for exploiting host resources during development. The first is for the parasitoid larvae to consume the entire host (such as a caterpillar) before...Read more |
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Master student in ecological genomics |
Suitable for Msc thesis, at least six months Evidence is accumulating that epigenetic mechanisms can affect heritable phenotypic traits and thus, may play a role in plant adaptation. However, little is known about the magnitude and relevance of functional epi-allelic variation in natural plant...Read more |
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MSc thesis project: Ecological and biophysical interactions of soil bacteriophages |
Soil microorganisms play important roles in carbon cycling, plant nutrition, and greenhouse gas production. Viruses that infect bacteria (phages) are abundant in soil, but their influence on these soil functions is not well known. In this project we develop and apply laboratory methods to assess...Read more |
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MSc thesis project: Ecological and biophysical interactions of soil bacteriophages |
Soil microorganisms play important roles in carbon cycling, plant nutrition, and greenhouse gas production. Viruses that infect bacteria (phages) are abundant in soil, but their influence on these soil functions is not well known. In this project, we develop and apply laboratory methods to assess...Read more |
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MSc thesis project: Effect of viruses on soil biogeochemical functions |
Soil microorganisms play key roles in carbon cycling, plant nutrition, and greenhouse gas production (N2O and CH4). Viruses, by increasing microbial death rates, could strongly affect these processes. Viruses that infect bacteria (phages) are abundant in soil (up to 1010 per gram), yet their...Read more |
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Nematode hitchhiking in shaping phage-bacterial interactions |
Nematodes and viruses (phages) are important predators of bacteria. Soil is a complex, spatially structured habitat that presents unique challenges for bacteria and their predators. Model experiments have shown that bacteria-feeding nematodes can move their prey to new resource patches, as well as...Read more |
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Plant-microbe-insect interactions |
Plants often recruit root symbionts to improve nutrient uptake and activate its defense system against various pests. Currently, a variety of biological control agents are available for use, including beneficial microbes that promote growth and tolerance to abiotic and biotic stress, but further...Read more |
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Soil ecology in arable farming across the Netherlands |
Soil biodiversity is of tremendous importance for soil quality and ecosystem functioning, as the soil microbiome and the larger soil food web importantly regulate biogeochemical cycling, (micro-)hydrology, greenhouse gas emissions, soil structure and erosion as well as the diversity of aboveground...Read more |
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Soil ecology in organic agriculture: how soil microbes and nematodes affect ecosystem functions |
Soil communities are involved in important ecosystem processes such as nutrient cycling, soil organic matter dynamics, and disease suppression. In the Vital Soils project we try to understand how soil communities are affected by agricultural management types and how soil communities affect...Read more |
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Trekken planten natuurlijke vijanden van hun wortelbelagers aan? |
Als planten worden aangevallen door bovengrondse insecten, worden bij een aantal plantensoorten stoffen vrijgemaakt die de parasitoiden van de insecten aantrekken. Er is vrijwel niets bekend of eenzelfde soort fenomeen (aantrekking van antagonisten als reactie op wortelaantasting door nematoden,...Read more |
