The Van Leeuwen Junior Group studies movement and interactions of plants and animals in freshwater ecosystems. We aim to understand how, why and when species move – and how their consequential presence or absence in ecosystems affects other species through species interactions.

Research

Freshwater ecosystems are species-rich, globally important natural systems that provide many services to humans. However, many wetlands, rivers and lakes are threatened by human activity such as fragmentation, eutrophication, warming and introductions of invasive species. Our group investigates the capacity of species to cope with these global changes. We study the ability of plants and animals to spatially escape unfavourable circumstances by dispersing elsewhere, and how flexible species are in responding to new conditions that they may have to face. We use field- and lab-based experiments with aquatic plants and animals, population genetic analyses, animal-tracking and advanced statistics – and address these questions on both ecological and evolutionary time scales.

Focal points of our research are:

  1. the ability of plant seeds and small aquatic invertebrates to disperse over long distance by using large, mobile vertebrate animals as vectors – in particular how waterbirds transport aquatic organisms internally and externally
  2. the response of fish populations to river fragmentation by dams, and how this may have direct and indirect consequences on both ecological and evolutionary time scales
  3. how species respond to rising water temperatures, and how this may change their interactions with species in other trophic levels
  4. the dispersal pathways of invasive species, and the resilience of ecosystems to their introductions.

More information on the interests of the group can be found at the start of this video that was made at a recent seminar, and all publications can be found on www.caspervanleeuwen.info.

Latest output:

  1. J.P van Zuidam*, C.H.A. van Leeuwen*, E.S. Bakker, J.T.A. Verhoeven, S. IJff, E.T.H.M. Peeters, B.G. van Zuidam, M.B. Soons (2018) Plant functional diversity and nutrient availability can improve restoration of floating fens via facilitation, complementarity and selection effects, Journal of Applied Ecology *equal contributions
  2. P. Zhang, R.F. van den Berg, C.H.A. van Leeuwen, B.A. Blonk, E.S. Bakker, (2018) Aquatic omnivores shift their trophic position towards increased plant consumption as plant stoichiometry becomes more similar to their body stoichiometry, PLoS ONE
  3. C.H.A. van Leeuwen (2018) Internal and external dispersal of plants by animals: an aquatic perspective on alien interference, 9:153 Frontiers in Plant Sciences
  4. Petruzzella, A., Manschot, J., Van Leeuwen, C.H.A., Grutters, B.M. and E.S. Bakker (2018) Mechanisms of invasion resistance of aquatic plant communities, 9:134 Frontiers in Plant Sciences
  5. Van Leeuwen, C.H.A., K. Dalen, J. Museth, C. Junge and L.A. Vøllestad (2018) Habitat fragmentation has interactive effects on the population genetic diversity and individual behaviour of a freshwater salmonid fish, 34(1):60-68 River Research and Applications
  6. Van Leeuwen, C.H.A., Á. Lovas-Kiss, M. Ovegård and A.J. Green (2017) Great cormorants reveal overlooked secondary dispersal of plants and invertebrates by piscivorous waterbirds, 13(10): 20170406 Biology Letters

 

Current group members:

PhD student Antonella Petruzzella (NIOO-KNAW)

PhD student María José Navarro (Doñana Biological Station)

PhD student Victor Martin (Doñana Biological Station) visiting in 2019

Guest researcher Rosanne Beukeboom

MSc student Robin de Vries

 

The group is associated to the Bakker Group