Winder Lab

Variation in fatty acid content among benthic invertebrates in a seasonally driven system Read the full study in Limnology and Oceanography Letter. In this study we test whether the succession from nutritious spring blooms to summer cyanobacteria is reducing food quality for benthic primary consumers and their fatty acid (FA) profiles. Contrary to expectations, we … More New study shows that trophic transfer of essential nutrients is complex

In this study we used data from dietary metabarcoding studies of zooplankton to calculate prey selectivity indices and assess energy fluxes in a pelagic resource-consumer network. We show that food web dynamics are influenced by prey selectivity and temporal match-mismatch in growth cycles and that cyanobacteria are the main source of primary production in the … More DNA metabarcoding highlights cyanobacteria as the main source of primary production in a pelagic food web model

Here, we investigate diet overlap between these three planktivorous fishes in the Baltic Sea, utilizing DNA metabarcoding on the 18S rRNA gene and the COI gene, targeted qPCR, and microscopy. Our results show niche differentiation between clupeids and stickleback, and highlight that rotifers play an important role in this pattern, as a resource that is not being used by … More New study using metabarcoding shows niche partitioning between planktivorous fish

Project meeting for ‘Larval Fish Production and Dispersal in Critical Habitats of Coastal East Africa’ in Tanga, Tanzania, March 2022.

We have a 4-yr PhD position available in our group focusing on protist parasites in plankon food webs. For details, please visit: Project descriptionThe Department of Ecology, Environment and Plant Sciences invites applications for a four-year PhD position part of the project ‘Drivers and functions of protist parasites in plankton food webs’. The goal of … More Open PhD position in Marine Biology

It is exciting that the Swedish Research Council has granted us funding for four years to continue our work on drivers and functions of plankton interactions. This specific project will investigate the role of parasitic symbionts in the functioning and equilibrium of carbon flow in marine food webs. We aim to resolve drivers and functions … More New research project from Vetenskapsrådet (VR)

Andreas Novotny and Per Hedberg successfully defended their PhDs – well done!

Alternative pathways of energy transfer guarantee the functionality and productivity in marine food webs that experience strong seasonality. Nevertheless, the complexity of zooplankton interactions is rarely considered in trophic studies because of the lack of detailed information about feeding interactions in nature. In this study, we used DNA metabarcoding to highlight the diversity of trophic … More DNA metabarcoding reveals trophic niche diversity of micro and mesozooplankton species

The Department of Ecology, Environment and Plant Sciences invites applications for a four-year PhD position part of the project ‘Plankton-fish interactions: An understudied link in Baltic Sea food webs and fisheries management’. The goal of this PhD project is to investigate prey preference of small pelagic fish including the entire prey spectrum using novel molecular … More We have an open PhD position in plankton ecology

Two master students finished their projects in Dec 2020: Calum Young: Examination of plankton communities, invaders and harmful algal species within mangrove areas of the Galápagos Islands using eDNA metabarcoding Phytoplankton are critical components of the marine environment but their understanding within the Galápagos Marine Reserve (GMR) remains largely underexplored with research focused within mangrove systems being further limited. Between November and December, the … More Congratulations to two successful master thesis presentations