The research stay of Borgå will be with Caroline Williams and her research group at UC Berkeley. Here, she will participate in field work as well as have office space in Williams’ laboratory. The Williams group is a strong research group focussing on how seasonality and timing affects insect physiology and ecology under climate change. They use three model systems to study these long-term changes, all terrestrial, whereas the Borgå group use two terrestrial systems (the pollinators bumble bees and soil arthropods springtails), in addition to several marine copepod species – an overall long-term goal is to learn what can be transferred between systems, and how can we generalise the knowledge on cumulative effects on ecosystems. This knowledge is of high value for Borgå’s ongoing projects funded by the RCN such as MULTICLIM, MULTICOP, Nansen Legacy and MULTIWHALE, as well as future plans for proposal.
One aim of the research stay is to foster future collaboration, aiming at the RCN application deadline spring 2023, and we will seek funding from the Peder Sather Center for Advanced study at UC Berkeley for a workshop in spring 2023.
The research stay will start with a common field work in the Sedgwick reserve, near Santa Ynez, where Borgå will join to learn the model system and methods. Then, back on Campus on Berkeley, the main aim is to be exposed to the research group activities, daily activities and laboratory procedures. During the research stay, I will also focus on own work, as the MULTICLIM is entering its final year, with many research results to summarise and publish.