| | 
The Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences is the only Swedish university fully devoted to
biological research and education concerning natural resource management. Among the prominent
units at this university are those involved in the present team, Section of Landscape Ecology, EVP,
and Department of Conservation Biology, and the Department of Entomology, to be joined with
EVP and NVB when the university re-organises in 2004. There are also several other departments
engaged in climate change research and environmental sciences. A number of national centres relevant
for this application are situated at the SLU campus in Uppsala, viz. the Swedish Biodiversity Centre,
the Swedish Threatened Species Unit, and the Centre for Sustainable Agriculture.
The two departments in the present team are, together with the Department of Entomology at SLU
with which have close collaboration, among the leading Swedish research teams in several areas of
applied ecology. We are particularly strong in:
(1) The landscape ecology of agricultural landscapes: diversity, biological control, organic farming
and ecosystem services.
(2) Spatial population dynamics in agroecosystems, pest management and conservation biological
control.
(3) Pollination biology and plant demography in agricultural landscapes, primarily semi-natural
grasslands.
(4) Interdisciplinary research for management of biodiversity in semi-natural grasslands: the national
program HagmarksMistra.
(5) Linking social institutions and planning to the dynamics of organisms important for ecosystem
services, in particular pollinators in urban-rural gradients (collaboration with the Beijer Institute and
Stockholm University).
We are regularly funded by the two main Swedish Research Councils, Formas and VR, and also by a
number of private and independent foundations.
We have good contacts with farmers and land owners, and a long tradition of performing field
experiments and large-scale landscape studies in the region of Central Sweden. Thus we can easily
provide northern field sites for the ALARM program.
RESEARCH TEAM:
Jan Bengtsson, Riccardo Bommarco
|
