Biology Education

Pollinating insects, such as wild bees, are declining worldwide, threatening pollination of both wild plants and agricultural crops. The main reason for these declines is intensive farming practices which leads to losses of nesting habitats and flowering food resources [1]. However, all species are not equally affected, with important consequences for which wild plant species or agricultural crops that may suffer pollination losses. This is because certain functional traits (e.g. morphological and life-history traits) make some species more vulnerable to landscape changes than others [2]. Information on which traits make species vulnerable may aid conservation of declining species, by for example, suggesting interventions that match species nesting and foraging preferences or mobility.
This project takes a landscape perspective on bee conservation by investigating how habitat availability and landscape scale complexity influence solitary bee communities.

Potential research questions are, for example:
– How is local bee abundance and diversity affected by local and landscape scale habitat availability?
– How do bee traits interact with habitat availability at local and landscape scales to shape bee communities?
– Is habitat availability (amount) or landscape characteristics most important in moderating bee community composition?

Methods
You will use existing data on cavity nesting bees, flower surveys and land-use data, collected in 54 sites across Scania, combined with data on bee traits. While there are straightforward research questions given by our landscape design, the project provides ample opportunities to analyse data in relation to research ideas developed by you. Depending on the research questions chosen, you will use methods such as GLMs and multivariate statistics. You may also extract additional spatial data on habitat availability using GIS.

Contact: Anna Persson (anna.persson@cec.lu.se) and Henrik Smith (henrik.smith@biol.lu.se)

References:

1. Potts et al (2010) Global pollinator declines: trends, impacts and drivers. DOI: 10.1016/j.tree.2010.01.007
2. De Palma (2015) Ecological traits affect the sensitivity of bees to land‐use pressures in European agricultural landscapes. DOI: 10.1111/1365-2664.12524

In recent decades, populations of many wild bird species have declined dramatically worldwide due to many factors associated with urbanisation. Climate change, induced by human activity, influence the population dynamics of wild birds due to its effect on behaviour, physiology, and reproduction. It was shown that in many wild bird species that not just the increasing temperature, but the unpredictable severe weather changes (i.e. immediate temperature drop, or snowing in April) can have a negative impact on nestlings´ growth or fledging success. Unfortunately, our knowledge about how hatching failure, as one of the main determinant of fitness, can change due to climate change, and how this effect is altered by urban environment (eg.: urban heat island effect), is scarce.

Aim of the study: Using our long-term dataset, we will to study, how temperature increase and extreme weather event influence hatching failure in 2 wild bird species (Blue and Great tits).

Questions:

Q1: Did hatching failure increase over the last decade?

Q2: Do the changes in hatching failure differ between urban and rural habitats?

Q3: Do the interaction between climate and urban environment influence hatching failure?

Your tasks:

• Collect basic breeding data in 2025, following the individual breeding attempt, ringing nestlings and adults, collecting unhatched eggs.
• Organise the data back till 2013 for your analysis.
• Collect the weather data for each nestbox from different databases.
• Carry out the statistical analysis.
• Write your thesis.

You will learn to:

• handle and measure birds
• use brightfield and fluorescent microscope, fluorescent DNA staining of the egg perivitelline layer
• basic principles of databases and using different statistical tools to analyse your data
• use GIS for analysing spatial data

Starting date: 1^st of April (but sooner is the better). Duration: 45-60 credits

Contact:

Main supervisor: Caroline Isaksson: caroline.isaksson@biol.lu.se

Co-supervisor: Zsófia Tóth: zsofia.toth@biol.lu.se

Long-term pair bonds are common in many large long-lived bird species but do also occur in small short-lived passerines. Mate retention and ‘divorce’ have been regarded as two sides of a strategy to increase reproductive success in Great Tits and Blue Tits as both occur regularly in these species. Both biotic (eg. food availability) or abiotic (eg. weather) factors can influence if the pair stay together or divorce within or between breeding seasons. Urban environment differs from rural environment regarding both biotic and abiotic factors leading to the birds need to cope with different challenges. However, the birds may choose different pair bonding strategy in urban and rural habitats to increase their fitness, up to date there is no study that investigated the differences in pair bonding in urban-rural comparison and its effect on fitness.

Aim of the study: Using a long-term dataset back till 2013, the project aim to study if urbanisation influence pair bonding, and if pair bonding has a direct effect on breeding success of great and blue tits.

Questions:

1. Is there any difference in pair bonding (and/or divorce rate) between urban and rural environments?
2. Does air or/and noise pollution influence pair bonding (and/or divorce rate)?
3. Does pair bonding (and/or divorce) influence hatching success, nestling size?

Your tasks:

• Collect basic breeding data in 2025, following the individual breeding attempt, ringing nestlings and adults.
• Organise the data for your analysis back till 2013.
• Modelling climate, and pollution data
• Carry out the statistical analysis.
• Write your thesis.

You will learn to:

• handle and measure birds
• basic principles of databases and using different statistical tools to analyse your data
• use GIS for analysing spatial data

Starting date: 1^st of April (but sooner is the better). Duration: 45-60 credits

Contact:

Main supervisor: Caroline Isaksson: caroline.isaksson@biol.lu.se

Co-supervisor: Zsófia Tóth: zsofia.toth@biol.lu.se

Pollutions from urban, industrial, and agricultural activities put ecological health at risk due to contamination and accumulation in wildlife and humans. Widespread effect of pollution, such as air and noise pollution, on animals have long been documented including its detrimental effect on physiology, reproduction and development. Growing evidences have shown that particulate matter, NOx and noise pollution are associated with impaired fetal development and adverse birth outcomes in human. Furthermore, it was shown in an experiment in zebra finches that the traffic noise can impair embryonic development leading to embryonic death. However, we know that anthropogenic pollution can trigger developmental failure, we do not know if it affects the natural populations or not.

Aim of the study: Investigate the effect of anthropogenic pollution on hatching failure rate and the cause of hatching failure (embryo death, fertilisation failure etc…) in Great and Blue tits (Parus major & Cyanistes caeruleus).

Questions: Does anthropogenic pollution (noise, particulate matter and NOx) influence hatching failure in natural populations?      

Your tasks:

• Collect basic breeding data in 2025, following the individual breeding attempt, ringing nestlings and adults, collecting unhatched eggs.
• Organise the data for your analysis for 3 years (2023-2025)
• Collect the noise pollution data for each nestbox based on the measurements of Naturvårdsverket. You will use QGIS for this.
• Carry out the statistical analysis.
• Write your thesis.

You will learn to:

• handle and measure birds
• basic principles of databases and using different statistical tools to analyse your data
• use GIS for analysing spatial data

Starting date: 1^st of April (but sooner is the better). Duration: 45-60 credits

Contact:

Main supervisor: Caroline Isaksson: caroline.isaksson@biol.lu.se

Co-supervisor: Zsófia Tóth: zsofia.toth@biol.lu.se

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) form symbiosis with approximately 80% of land plants. The arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis has been extensively studied, however, most studies have been conducted from the perspective of the plant, and there is little known about the decision making and foraging behaviors of the fungi themself. In the soil, multiple AMF cohabit but little is known about how they interact with each other. Interaction between different species of fungi has been done on wood decomposers which unraveled some programmed cell death mechanisms. However, with AMF, it is difficult to study the interaction of two individuals due to their obligate biotrophy and very sparse mycelium.

In this project we will combine microfluidic soil chip systems with AMF symbiotic systems. The soil chips (developed in the team) are ideal for studying hyphal architecture and monitoring growth patterns of hyphae and mycelia over time. They can provide a useful tool to help us understand the hyphal behavior of AMF outside of plant tissues during the symbiosis. With this system we can measure how fungi forage for resources in a complex and microscopically heterogenous environment, and study their strategies implemented to explore their environment. We can also study the interaction between species at the micrometer scale and single out individual hyphae to gain insight into how fungal tips respond.

In the team, one species of AMF has been studied in soil chips (Hammer et al., 2024), but AMF form a very diverse group with very different morphological and physiological traits. It is therefore unknown if other AMF species behave the same way and present the same characteristics in the soil chip.

During this project you will be involved in all aspects of fsetting up and running the experiment, fabricating the soil chips, inoculating them, monitoring the fungal growth using microscopy and analyzing the images and results.

Duration: 45-60 cr MSc thesis

Contact: Ayla Mongés ayla.monges@biol.lu.se, Kristin Aleklett Kadish kristin.aleklett_kadish@biol.lu.se

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) form symbiosis with approximately 80% of land plants. The arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis has been extensively studied, however, there is little known about the decision making and foraging behaviors of the fungi themself. Marchantia paleacea is a liverwort and a model plant for studying the arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis. This plant has many advantages for this due to its size and ease of cultivation as well as the possibility to observe fungal colonization in its rhizoids. It also gives us a clue about how some of the first land living plants interacted with fungi to overcome the many stresses of colonizing land.

One of the reasons why the study of AMF is difficult is because they are obligate symbionts. They can survive only a few weeks after germination without a host plant.  In this project we will use a medium developed by Tanaka et al., 2022 that allow the autonomous growth of AMF. By growing AMF together with Marchantia on this particular medium or not, we can further assess the decision-making processes of the fungus.

During this project, you will be involved in all aspects of the experiment: setting the AMF cultures, growing them with Marchantia, inoculating the plants, monitoring the fungal growth and plant colonization using microscopy and images analysis of results.

Duration: 45-60 cr MSc project

Contact: Ayla Mongés ayla.monges@biol.lu.se, Kristin Aleklett Kadish kristin.aleklett_kadish@biol.lu.se

MSc project in Evolutionary Biology

Food availability is a key aspect of the environment for arguably most species. It affects how organisms allocate their time and energy among different behaviours such as foraging, avoiding predators, mating, and reproducing. When food is scarce, organisms often face a trade-off between investing in reproduction or in growth and maintenance, or between reproducing now or later. Dietary restriction can thus influence reproductive strategies and the evolution of reproductive traits.

Fish in the family Poeciliidae show a staggering diversity of reproductive adaptations: some lay eggs, others don’t, some provide their unborn offspring with nutrients before fertilisation, others only after fertilisation. Curiously, some species have even evolved the ability to carry multiple broods at different developmental stages, a phenomenon called superfetation. Several of these reproductive adaptations are hypothesised to have evolved as a response to low or fluctuating food availability.

In this project, we will examine how high or low food levels influence reproduction in one poeciliid fish –  the Trinidadian guppy. Traits to look at include, e.g., reproductive timing, offspring number and size, gestation length, and the presence of superfetation. The project will be conducted in my newly built, state-of-the-art fish research laboratory.

Required knowledge: This project can include anything from life-history, behavioural, post-mortem and advanced statistical analyses. A strong interest in evolutionary biology, attention to detail, team spirit, and a caring attitude towards laboratory fish are paramount. Familiarity with R is helpful but not needed. You will receive education in animal experimentation ethics

Length of project: 45-60 credits MSc level (60 credits preferred)

Start date: flexible but in September 2025 at the latest

Part-time work: there is a possibility for 1-4 hours/day of paid work, performing animal husbandry and maintenance tasks in my guppy laboratory

Supervisor: Anja Felmy, Homepage: https://portal.research.lu.se/en/persons/anja-felmy

Contact details: Send an email to anja.felmy@biol.lu.se or just drop by my office (D115, Ecology Building ground floor, near seminar room Tanken)!

MSc project in Evolutionary Biology

Evolution happens constantly all around us. This fast, contemporary evolution can allow populations to adapt and persist or lead to their decline and extinction. Which one it will be is often unclear, because current methods to predict short-term evolution work poorly when applied to natural populations. In light of the global environmental crisis, this is particularly alarming. A key cause of the predictive inaccuracy is environmental variation.

Food availability is a crucial aspect of the environment in many species. In my group, we thus study how variation in individuals’ (food) environment impacts evolution and its predictability. One hypothesis we test is whether including information on individual food acquisition can improve predictions of evolution. To do so, we first must know which phenotypic traits capture an individual’s ability to identify, acquire, and utilise food.

In this project, we will therefore examine which traits  – e.g., feeding rate, excretion rate, eye size, mouth morphology, gut length, or percentage fat – explain variation between individuals in how good they are at acquiring food. The project will be conducted in my newly built, state-of-the-art fish research laboratory, using Trinidadian guppies.

Required knowledge: This project is versatile and can include anything from morphometric, behavioural, physiological, post-mortem and advanced statistical analyses. A strong interest in evolutionary biology, attention to detail, team spirit, and a caring attitude towards laboratory fish are paramount. Familiarity with R is helpful but not required. You will receive education in animal experimentation ethics.

Length of project: 45-60 credits MSc level (60 credits preferred)

Start date: flexible but in September 2025 at the latest

Part-time work: there is a possibility for 1-4 hours/day of paid work, performing animal husbandry and lab maintenance tasks in my guppy laboratory

Supervisor: Anja Felmy, Homepage: https://portal.research.lu.se/en/persons/anja-felmy

Contact details: Send an email to anja.felmy@biol.lu.se or just drop by my office (D115, Ecology Building ground floor, near seminar room Tanken)!