Aquatic invertebrate ecology and paleoecology in arctic ecosystems

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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.