“Giving nature the space it needs can help protect and restore the ecosystems we depend on for the food we eat, the water we drink and the air we breathe.”
Research focus: ecology, biodiversity and nature conservation
Merel Soons is Professor of Plant Dispersal Ecology & Conservation at Utrecht University and Vice-Chair of Future Food Utrecht. She is also a board member of Utrecht University’s Sustainability Programme. Her main research interests lie in the field of spatial ecology: the mechanisms of dispersal, colonization and migration of plants and animals, the interactions of these processes with ongoing global change (mainly habitat fragmentation and climate change), and their consequences for biodiversity patterns.
In her research, Merel investigates spatial ecological processes at the ecosystem to landscape scale, using a combination of field data collection, experiments and modeling approaches. In her dispersal research she uses a movement ecology framework to investigate both plant and animal movement. Merel combines work on the building of fundamental ecological theory with the application of ecological knowledge in nature conservation and restoration. She believes this combination of fundamental science and its application to key environmental problems is what society needs from the scientific community.
Much of Merel’s research is on wetlands and the ecology of freshwater ecosystems, which are globally threatened but of great natural and societal importance. She is based at the Ecology & Biodiversity research group and is a multiple NWO laureate (Meervoud, VIDI and Aspasia personal grants).
Areas of expertise:
- Biodiversity
- Ecology
- Nature conservation
- Nature management
- Nature restoration
- Wetlands
Samen voor biodiversiteit (in Dutch)
Wat is de natuur ons waard? (in Dutch)
Research team
PhD students and postdocs
- A.P. (Ana Patricia) Sandoval Calderon
- Dr. M. (Maitreyi) Sur
- R. (Robert) Timmers
- S. (Shengnan) Wang
- Y.N. (Yannick) Wiegers
Former research team members
- Dr. M. (Monique) de Jager
- Dr. R.G.A. (Rob) Fraaije
- Dr. A.G. (Annemarie) Garssen
- Dr. E. (Erik) Kleyheeg
- Dr. J.M. (Judith) Sarneel
- Dr. H.J. (Jelle) Treep
- Dr. C.H.A. (Casper) van Leeuwen
- Dr. J.P. (Jeroen) van Zuidam