Aquatic invertebrate ecology and paleoecology

我的研究方法使用一套生物指标(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)的活种群，以确定这个底栖群落中不同类群的生态。对生物摇蚊群落的生态学有了足够的了解，对沉积物岩心中的摇蚊化石标本的分析可以推断水环境的长期变化。我的研究计划还将涉及浮游动物(枝角类)的组合，以推断过去的环境条件。这种方法使我们能够估计这些系统中的背景、干扰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。该计划将研究加拿大北极地区池塘和湖泊对20世纪气候变暖的长期生态系统响应，重点是水生昆虫群落。该计划还将检查浮游动物群落是否能够预测北方屏蔽湖中鱼类的数量。然后确定是否可以使用古生态方法来估计内陆渔业过去的状况。这将为评估当前内陆湖泊的渔业健康状况提供一个创新的视角。

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. My research programme will also involve zooplankton (Cladocera) assemblages to infer past environmental conditions. 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 programme will examine long-term ecosystem responses to 20th century climate warming in pond and lakes located in Canada's Arctic regions, with a focus on aquatic insect communities.  This programme will also examine if zooplankton communities can predict the size of fish populations in boreal shield lakes, and then determine if paleoecological approaches can be used to estimate past conditions of inland fisheries.  This would provide an innovative perspective in assessing current fisheries health in inland lakes.