Bilberry Ecology and the Regeneration of forest Ecosystem Functioning

Bilberry Ecology and the Regeneration of forest Ecosystem Functioning

Human impacts such as clearcut harvesting have left forests bereft of the organisms that underpin their functioning. The decline of key plant species has reduced the capacity of forests to store carbon (C) and provide ecosystem services to the people of Europe. The regeneration of forest ecosystem functioning requires a deeper understanding of how the traits of its species can be linked to ecosystem processes. The BEREFT project aims to elucidate how the plant traits of bilberry, Vaccinium myrtillus, modulate the dynamics of C and nitrogen (N) within the boreal forest. The project combines advances in chemical ecology with an innovative experimental design situated in Norway pairing experimental plots in formerly clearcut forest plantations with those from near-natural forests. I will collect a comprehensive set of bilberry's chemical traits and test both in-situ and in-vitro experiments to determine the underlying mechanism linking bilberry traits to C and N dynamics. The project goes beyond the state-of-the-art in applying novel methods from chemical ecology to measure bilberry's traits and uses a creative design to link those traits to ecosystem functioning. Through the scope of traits measured and the innovation in experimental design pairing clearcut forests with near-natural forests, this project will significantly advance our knowledge of the ecology of Europe's forest ecosystems. I will receive training in chemical ecology to advance my career as an expert in data generation and exchange with the host my knowledge on long-term ecological experimentation and ecosystem functioning. The project will disseminate deliverables in trait data packages, an open-source chemical ecology pipeline, and a robust measure of the effect size of bilberry's impact on C and N in the boreal forest. Knowledge of bilberry's role in the forest C cycle can be exploited by forestry managers in efforts to maximize C storage to meet the EU's goal of carbon neutrality.