I am a (polar) marine biogeoscientist. My research aims at providing an historical, long-term perspective to the on-going changes in the ocean"

Key aspects: (past) climate change, Antarctica and polar ocean, coastal (human-impacted) areas.

Understanding when, how, and how quickly natural changes in the ocean occurred in the (recent) geological past helps putting recent and present human-driven changes in perspective and may help understanding climate feedbacks. This view is key in the discussion for a sustainable (future) ocean. 

My main expertise is in marine palynology a field, which uses fossil remains of marine organisms (dinoflagellates) as proxy for paleoenvironmental and paleoclimate reconstructions. The complexity of the marine and the climate systems requires a multidisciplinary approach and my projects are highly interdisciplinary (inorganic and organic geochemistry, sedimentology, micropaleontology).

Main interests and projects relate to:

Polar (Antarctic and Arctic) Neogene and Quaternary ecology, climate and oceanography; ocean-cryosphere interaction.

Eutrophication and productivity trends, including Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs), and hypoxia/anoxia: natural variability vs anthropogenic impact; Land-sea nexus, rivers, deltas, estuaries.

Sustainable Ocean: the Sustainable Ocean Community (Pathways to Sustainibility, UU), which I have set up together with Erik van Sebille (Physics), Alex Oude Elferink (REBO), broadens my view on the ocean as a living organism, and this spikes ideas on how humans can achieve a sustainable use of the ocean, if humans have the right to intervene on the ocean, and more scientific, legal, philosophical and ethical questions. It is just the beginning, more to come ...  

CHECK IT OUT! https://www.uu.nl/en/research/sustainability/thematic-communities/sustainable-ocean