Interglacials and glacials – natural experiments in ecosystem assembly, restoration, and biodiversity dynamics (IGNEX-eco)

In this project we are going to use long-term pollen records from different parts of the world – Colombia, Greece, and Northeast Russia - to compare different interglacial and glacial periods during the Quaternary and to investigate how ecosystems have changed over time. We are interested in finding out how and how quickly an ecosystem and its biodiversity are restored after glacial periods.  For ecosystem restoration, it is important to know the past states of the ecosystem and what determines the long-term ecosystem assembly, composition, structure, biodiversity and turnover, and we aim to test various hypotheses that concern this.

Vivians education includes a bachelor degree in biology, a master degree in Biodiversity, Evolution and Ecology, and a PhD about pollen and vegetation diversity from the University of Bergen. Her research interests include biodiversity patterns and trends at different scales in space and time, vegetation history, ecosystems and ecosystem changes, alpine ecology, and numerical and statistical methods in ecology and palaeoecology.