Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts

Research group of Sabine Hilt
Submerged macrophytes and periphyton in Lake Stechlin in August 2014. | Photo: Sabine Hilt / IGB

Submerged macrophytes and periphyton in Lake Stechlin in August 2014. | Photo: Sabine Hilt / IGB

We investigate the effects of altered external factors such as nutrient and terrestrial carbon inputs and temperature on freshwater ecosystems. We focus on causes and consequences of resilience and regime shifts, using lowland lakes and rivers as model systems. Our studies mainly focus on benthic primary producers (underwater plants, periphyton) and their interactions with biotic and abiotic components of freshwater ecosystems. Our aim is to improve knowledge of quantitative aspects of regime shifts and to elucidate its implications for ecosystem functions such as biodiversity, primary productivity, carbon burial, greenhouse gas emissions, and nutrient retention. Our research spectrum ranges from the individual organism to the entire ecosystem and combines long-term data series with large and small-scale experimental approaches in the laboratory and field, molecular methods, paleolimnology and modeling.

Team

Sabine Hilt

Research Group Leader
Research group
Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts

Uta Müller

Postdoc
Research group
Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts

Nikola Stankovic

Postdoc
Research group
Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts

Sven Meißner

Postdoc
Research group
Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts

Julia Scheunert

Research Technician
Research group
Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts

Anna Lena Kronsbein

Doctoral Candidate
Research group
Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts

Jonas Mauch

Doctoral Candidate
Research group
Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts

Haowu Cheng

Doctoral Candidate
Research group
Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts

Samantha Plank

Voluntary Ecological Year (FÖJ)
Research group
Aquatic-Terrestrial Coupling and Regime Shifts
Selected publications
March 2018

Response of submerged macrophyte communities to external and internal restoration measures in north temperate shallow lakes

Sabine Hilt; Marta M. Alirangues Nunez; Elisabeth S. Bakker; Irmgard Blindow; Thomas A. Davidson; Mikael Gillefalk; Lars-Anders Hansson; Jan H. Janse; Annette B. G. Janssen; Erik Jeppesen; Timm Kabus; Andrea Kelly; Jan Köhler; Torben L. Lauridsen; Wolf M. Mooij; Ruurd Noordhuis; Geoff Phillips; Jacqueline Rücker; Hans-Heinrich Schuster; Martin Sondergaard; Sven Teurlincx; Klaus van de Weyer; Ellen van Donk; Arno Waterstraat; Nigel Willby; Carl D. Sayer
Frontiers in Plant Science. - 9(2018)art. 194