Suggested BIO299 project topics
Camera surveillance of pollinators in alpine grasslands
Are alpine flowers visited more during the day, or during the night? Does the importance of nocturnal pollinators differ with elevation? How do alpine pollinators respond to warming treatments? And is it possible that some pollinators “bully” others away from flowers while foraging? These are all questions that insect surveillance cameras help to address. We have recorded millions of images of flowers introduced to mountain sites in Switzerland, Norway and South Africa. They are a gold mine of information about plant-pollinator and pollinator-pollinator interactions. Projects will involve searching for and identifying pollinators in images, answering questions about the impacts of climate change on pollination and species interactions. In the process, contributors will help to build a collaborative dataset for automated pollinator detection and are likely to be considered authors on a resulting publication. Why contribute? Beyond potential co-authorship on a publication, contributors get to work with a team of international researchers in the RangeX project, an international project about the impacts of range-expanding plants in mountains. They will receive training in image labeling and basic insect identification. We can offer supervision to committed contributors and create a project with independent analysis. We could even offer some insights into statistics with R. Potential project ideas include: Seasonal or day/night visitation patterns of pollinator communities Responses of insect pollinators to warming treatments Characteristics of pollinator communities at high and low elevations Interactions between insect pollinator guilds Tiers of contribution We invite contributions in two tiers, depending on if you want to co-design a research project. Super-contributor: Label at least 5000 flower hours (100 hours of work, following ~25 flowers through their lives). Adopt a research project, with supervision, tackling specific questions. Contributor: Label at least 500 flower hours (10 hours of work) from a cross-section of flowers and regions to co-create the dataset. You may still be invited to co-author a publication. Contact Jamie Alison (jalison@ecos.au.dk) and Nadine Arzt (nadine.arzt@uib.no) for further details!
Soil carbon stocks
Carbon storage is an important ecosystem service, yet we know very little about how much our ecosystems store. Semi-natural systems are especially understudied. First results show that these ecosystems might be some of the most carbon rich! Question: How much soil carbon is stored in western Norwegian semi-natural ecosystems, specifically coastal heathlands and grasslands? For more information, reach out to Siri Haugum at the Heathland centre / Lyngheisenteret
How can we characterize the microclimates of dwarf-shrubs? (Durin)
Leaf temperatures have a major influence on plant growth and development, e.g. photosynthesis rates, and thermal tolerance limits. However, our ability to measure such important characteristics has until recently been limited. Now with thermal imagery we can measure leaf temperatures directly! Learn to analyze thermal images collected on dwarf-shrub canopies across Norway. compare thermal profiles of different dwarf-shrub species and/or compare how different leaf temperatures are from the more traditionally used microclimate data collected from plant-level loggers, and weather stations. We have an existing database from across Norwegian heathland ecosystems, but some opportunities may still exist for data collection from heathland systems around Bergen. Have a look at the DURIN page and contact Sonya Geange at Sonya.Geange@uib.no for more info!
The belowground life of roots in alpine grasslands (Funder)
Often when we characterize plant growth and development, we focus on the above-ground, but less-so the below-ground. Here we focus on the important alpine grasslands of Norway, and we take a dive below to better understand how these communities are utilizing resources such as water and nutrients below-ground, including: 1) Does the biomass of roots differ among alpine, sub-alpine and boreal forest communities? And will these patterns vary across sites with different precipitation levels, and/or 2) Do the roots differ in their characteristics, i.e. root length, dimensions, proportion of fine roots vs tap roots, indicating different resource use across the sites? For more information, contact Sonya Geange at Sonya.Geange@uib.no and the FUNDER webpage
How dwarf-shrubs allocate carbon (Durin)
In the DURIN project, we are investigating how environmental factors and vegetation characteristics impact ecosystem functioning and carbon dynamics in heathland ecosystems. To better understand how dwarf-shrubs are distributing to their above ground carbon resources, we will assess patterns of shoot growth, leaf longevity, and relative investment into stems and leaves on harvested dwarf-shrubs from across Norwegian heathlands. Join us to learn how do carbon allocation patterns differ: 1)Between dwarf-shrubs which were harvested from forested and open habitats across Norway and/or 2)Between dwarf-shrubs which were growing under different drought treatments and fire histories. For more information, contact Sonya Geange at Sonya.Geange@uib.no and Kristine Birkeli at Kristine.Birkeli@uib.no