AUTHOR BIOGRAPHIES
Johannes (Hans) H.C. Cornelissen (corresponding author) is a full professor at Systems
Ecology, VU University Amsterdam. He uses functional trait variation among plant species to
understand how vegetation composition orchestrates biogeochemical cycling, with focus on
decomposition, fire and productivity. He applies this approach to predicting how global
changes will alter soil functions through species shifts.
Address: Systems Ecology, Dept. of Ecological Science, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences,
VU University, De Boelelaan 1085, 1081 HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands
e-mail: j.h.c.cornelissen@vu.nl
Ute Sass-Klaassen is an assistant professor at the Forest Ecology and Forest Management
Group at Wageningen University. She combines forest ecology, wood anatomy and
dendrochronology and studies relationship between tree growth and environmental factors in
temperate and tropical forests.
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems,
Wageningen University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Lourens Poorter is an associate professor at the Forest Ecology and Forest Management
Group at Wageningen University. He investigates how functional traits shape species
performance and distribution along environmental gradients; their consequences for
community assembly and species coexistence; and how traits scale-up at the community level,
determining ecosystem processes and services.
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems,
Wageningen University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Koert van Geffen is a PhD candidate at the Nature Conservation and Plant Ecology Group at
Wageningen University. He currently investigates the effects of artificial light on ecosystems
in the Netherlands. He still cultivates a strong interest in decomposition and carbon cycling,
which took him to Bolivian forests and subarctic ecosystems during his MSc studies.
Address: Nature Conservation and Plant Ecology Group, PO Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen
University, Wageningen, The Netherlands
Richard S.P. van Logtestijn is a research technician at Systems Ecology, VU University
Amsterdam. He specialises in global change ecology of northern ecosystems and carbon and
nutrient cycling processes. He frequently applies stable isotope techniques to track carbon and
nitrogen through ecosystems and organisms at different trophic levels.
Address: Systems Ecology, Dept. of Ecological Science, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences,
VU University, De Boelelaan 1085, 1081 HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Jurgen van Hal is a research technician at Systems Ecology, VU University Amsterdam.
Among many other ecological activities he has a particular interest in invertebrate animals,
which is coming out useful more and more in investigations on the role of invertebrates in
decomposition processes and climate change ecology.
Address: Systems Ecology, Dept. of Ecological Science, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences,
VU University, De Boelelaan 1085, 1081 HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Leo Goudzwaard is a research technician at the Forest Ecology and Forest Management
Group at Wageningen University. Both his research activities and his intensive teaching
programme are focussed on forest ecology and nature conservation.
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems, Wageningen
University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Frank J. Sterck is an assistant professor at the Forest Ecology and Forest Management
Group at Wageningen University. He is a forest ecologist and ecophysiologist with a strong
interest in mathematical modelling of tree growth and vegetation dynamics. He has worked in
several tropical and temperate systems with specific focus on Ethiopian woodland.
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems, Wageningen
University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
René K.W.M. Klaassen is a senior researcher at SHR Timber Research in Wageningen. His
PhD (Leiden University) was on wood anatomy. At SHR he is doing research on timber
species in relation to resistance against wood degraders. The company tests, monitors and
researches new opportunities for timber uses; sustainable applications and timber uses are
important.
Address: SHR Timber Research, Nieuwe Kanaal 9b, 6709 PA Wageningen, The Netherlands
Annemieke van der Wal is a postdoctoral researcher at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology
in Wageningen. She is a microbial ecologist who has worked on the role of microbial
communities in nature conservation, especially in the transformation of agricultural land into
new nature. She recently started new studies on competitive and facilitative interactions
among microbes in decaying wood.
Address: Department of Microbial Ecology, Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOOKNAW), Droevendaalsesteeg 10, 6708 PB, Wageningen, The Netherlands
Grégoire T. Freschet is a post-doctoral researcher at the Department of Forest Ecology and
Management at SLU in Umeå, Sweden. His PhD study addressed how whole-plant economic
strategies drive carbon and nutrient cycling in subarctic terrestrial forests and freshwater
ecosystems’. He currently studies the effects that persistent past land use by indigenous
Saami people has on the current functioning of boreal forest ecosystems.
Address: Department of Forest Ecology and Management at SLU in Umeå, Sweden
Henk Eshuis is an ecologist who recently graduated from his MSc studies in Forest and
Nature Conservation, specialisation Ecology at Wageningen University. His Msc studies took
him to Ivory Coast camera trapping pigmy hippos and to Slovakia working on soil respiration
and vegetation succession after a catastrophic storm in Norway spruce dominated forest.
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems, Wageningen
University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Juan Zuo is a PhD student at Systems Ecology, VU University Amsterdam. Her MSc studies,
at SW China University, Chongqing, highlighted the interacting roles of plant pH and soil pH
on litter decomposition. Her current work research is on the biodiversity associated with wood
decay of different tree species at subsequent decay stages.
Address: Systems Ecology, Dept. of Ecological Science, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences,
VU University, De Boelelaan 1085, 1081 HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Wietse de Boer is a senior researcher at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology in Wageningen.
He is a microbial ecologist with a particular interest in the role of fungal and bacterial
interactions in agricultural, forest and natural systems, combining ecological and molecular
analyses. A specific focus of his research concerns interactions between bacteria and fungi in
decaying wood.
Address: Department of Microbial Ecology, Netherlands, Institute of Ecology (NIOOKNAW), Droevendaalsesteeg 10, 6708 PB Wageningen, The Netherlands
Teun Lamers is an MSc student at the Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group at
Wageningen University. His current MSc research relates functional traits of Dutch tree
species to their ecological strategies.
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems, Wageningen
University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Monique Weemstra is an MSc student at the Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group
at Wageningen University. Her current MSc research is on linking growth patterns of multiple
Dutch tree species to annual climatic variation over four decades.
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems, Wageningen
University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Vincent Cretin is an MSc student at the Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group at
Wageningen University. He takes an interest in forest ecology and did a thesis project on the
effects of the exotic forest invader Prunus serotina on soil processes.
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems, Wageningen
University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Rozan Martin is an MSc student at the Ecology and Biodiversity Group at Utrecht
University. He models carbon stocks and dynamics in vegetation and soil.
Address: Ecology and Biodiversity Group, Institute of Environmental Biology, Utrecht
University, Padualaan 8, 3584 CH Utrecht, The Netherlands
Jan den Ouden is an assistant professor at the Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group
at Wageningen University. Both his research and teaching cover a broad spectrum of forest
ecology, with specific focus on forest dynamics, seed dispersal and forest management.
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems, Wageningen
University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Matty P. Berg is an associate professor at Animal Ecology at VU University in Amsterdam.
His research interests cover spatial ecology, invertebrate biodiversity and its effect on
ecosystem functions, food web ecology, and global change ecology. Recently he has begun to
apply the trait concept to study invertebrate community responses and effects of soil animals
on ecosystems.
Address: Animal Ecology, Dept. of Ecological Science, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences,
VU University, De Boelelaan 1085, 1081 HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Rien Aerts is a full professor and head of Systems Ecology at VU University Amsterdam.
His research covers many aspects of nutrient and carbon cycling as well as global change
ecology, with specific interest in plant nutrient use efficiency, litter decomposition, ecosystem
response to nitrogen deposition and arctic ecosystems under a warming climate.
Address: Systems Ecology, Dept. of Ecological Science, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences,
VU University, De Boelelaan 1085, 1081 HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Godefridus (Frits) M.J Mohren is a full professor and head of the Forest Ecology and
Forest Management Group at Wageningen University. His research focuses on forest
production ecology and forest management, which involves tree ecophysiology and forest
modelling. These models incorporate environmental impacts of natural disturbances,
pollutants and climatic changes
Address: Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Centre for Ecosystems, Wageningen
University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands
Mariet M. Hefting is an assistant professor at the Ecology and Biodiversity Group at Utrecht
University. Her research focuses predominantly on microbial driven soil processes related to
nitrogen and carbon cycling. She has a long-term interest in landscape-scale nutrient and
water dynamics, including the identification of hot spots and ‘hot moments’ of nitrous oxide
emission in riverine ecosystems. More recently she has become strongly involved in research
into soil carbon sequestration as dependent on plant litter secondary chemistry.
Address: Ecology and Biodiversity Group, Institute of Environmental Biology, Utrecht
University, Padualaan 8, 3584 CH Utrecht, The Netherlands