Aquatic invertebrate ecology and paleoecology in arctic ecosystems

我的研究方法使用一套生物指示剂（例如水生昆虫）来推断湖泊和池塘过去的环境条件。这种方法需要收集水生昆虫幼虫（主要是摇蚊科，“摇蚊”）的活种群，以确定该底栖群落中不同类群的生态。有了对活体摇蚊群落生态学的足够了解，对沉积物岩心中的化石摇蚊标本进行分析就可以推断出水生环境的长期变化。这种方法使我们能够估计这些系统中的背景、扰动前条件和自然生态变异性，这对于正确评估生态系统如何响应环境变化以及描述过去生态系统变化的时间、幅度和性质是必要的。  该项目将研究加拿大北极地区池塘和湖泊生态系统对 20 世纪气候变暖的长期反应，重点关注水生昆虫群落。

My research approach uses a suite of bioindicators (such as aquatic insects) to infer past environmental conditions in lakes and ponds. This approach requires the collection of living populations of larval aquatic insects (primarily Chironomidae, 'chironomids') to determine the ecology of different taxa in this benthic community. With sufficient knowledge on the ecology of living chironomid communities, the analysis of fossil chironomid specimens from sediment cores can generate inferences of long-term changes in aquatic environments. This approach allows us to estimate background, pre-disturbance conditions and natural ecological variability in these systems, which are necessary for a proper assessment of how ecosystems have responded to environmental changes and describing the timing, magnitude and nature of past ecosystem changes.  This project will examine long-term ecosystem responses to 20th century climate warming in ponds and lakes located in Canada's Arctic, with a focus on aquatic insect communities.