NWO Veni granted!

I am beyond happy that my NWO Veni proposal ‘Seas of change: how exotic marine plants reshape blue carbon ecosystems’ was granted! The NWO Veni grant allows early career researchers to further develop their own research ideas over the next three years.

Mixed native and exotic seagrass meadow on Bonaire, Caribbean

This means that from January 2027 I will be employed at the University of Amsterdam to continue my research on the impacts of exotic seagrass. Brief summary of my project below:

Exotic plants are rapidly transforming coastal ecosystems that are already under pressure from environmental change. We do not fully understand how local grazers, such as sea turtles and fish, respond to these newcomers, how their feeding interacts with plant-associated microbes, and how these combined interactions affect ecosystem stability and carbon storage. My project will dive into the world of seagrass meadows, combining large-scale underwater mapping, grazing experiments and fine-scale microbial analysis. By comparing regions with different invasion histories, the research will reveal how marine communities respond to invasion and provide practical insights for managing exotic species and protecting natural carbon stores.

For this project, I will work together with, amongst others, scientists from the Caribbean and Mediterranean Sea. Field updates and opportunities for student projects will follow soon!