Past Projects Ecosystem Research, Geoarchaeology and Polar Ecology

Island Ecosystems Research Projects

• Floreana and San Cristobal Islands, Galapagos, Ecuador: Anthropogenic Landscape Changes

Continental Ecosystems Research Projects

• Historical soil erosion events of central Europe (only available in german)
• High-resolution reconstruction of continental climate and environmental developments during the Funnel Beaker Period in lake areas
• Holocene soil deposition and erosion in lake settlement areas
• Holocene soil deposition and erosion in the black soil plain of central Germany
• Environmental changes affecting medieval villages of Brandenburg
• Geoarchaeological and geomorphological investigations of the Arslantepe tell at Malatya, Turkey
• Geoarchaeological and geomorphological investigations at archaeological excavations in Bosnia-Herzegovina
• Effects of land use in China during the last 5000 years

"Human Development in Landscapes" graduate school projects (selected examples)

• Adaptation of geomorphometry for research of past and present ecosystems
• Geomorphological and geoarcheological investigations of a multi-phased settlement mound in Sachsen-Anhalt
• Reconstruction of the Holocene landscape development of Germany's "Mittelgebirge Spessarts" region
• Landscape and land use dynamics in southern Ethiopia zum Anfang

Past Projects Geobotany (until 2014)

• Rehabilitation of degraded shore profiles of lakes within Holstein's "Switzerland" region (only available in german)
• AuDiD - Dispersion, diasporan accessibility, and diversity in river valley landscapes (only available in german)
• Eider Valley grazing landscapes (only available in german)
• EUROPEAT (only available in german)
• Red List plant communities of Schleswig-Holstein
• Synopsis of plant communities of Germany: Moor vegetation
• Synopsis of plant communities of Germany: Coastal vegetation
• European Vegetation Survey

Past Projects Environmental History and Environmental Archives

• Stymphacore Project (Greece)
• Reconstructing the long-term dynamics in the Winderatter See catchment (Schleswig - Holstein) and disentangling the relative impacts of climate warming and eutrophication

Past Projects Applied Ecology and Palaeoecology

Palaeoecology,  project area: Holocene vegetation dynamics and land use history of selected regions in Europe

Holocene vegetation dynamics are investigated using pollen and macroremain (wood, charcoal, seeds, fruits, etc.) analysis in selected regions, attempting to answer regionally specific research questions. Changes of vegetation are caused by a bundle of factors including climate, soil development, plant migrations, animals and human activities. We especially focus on the attempt to reconstruct the composition of vegetation on fine spatial scales, which we address by the combination of pollen and macrofossil analysis.

• High-resolution temporal and spatial reconstruction of the vegetation history and environmental changes in western Ireland: The Neolithic landnam event during the mid-Holocene
• Vegetation history of Eastern Bavaria

Woodland history of Schleswig-Holstein
Woodland history in the forest-poor german federal state of Schleswig-Hostein is still poorly understood. To gain detailed information of former woodland composition and woodland continuity, especially in the Late Holocene, we perform palynological, anthracological, and archaeological (including experimental archaeology) research.

• Today’s scarcity of woodland, ecological forestry and Ancient woods
• Use of charcoal production sites as archives for woodland history
• Pollen analysis reveals landscape change
• Sustainable woodland use during Middle Ages and Early Modern Times?

Palaeoecology,  project area: Graduate School “Human Development in Landscapes”

The research group is currently involved with six palaeoecological dissertation projects in the international Graduate School “Human Development in Landscapes. The Graduate School is financed in the framework of the excellence initiative of the federal state and the Bundesländer.  

• Forest dynamics and fire history in northern Germany as documented by anthracological and dendroecological approaches
• Reconstruction of the Forest and Land Use History from Neolithic to the Present in Westensee moraine region, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany
• Prehistoric wooded Environment and wood economy in Northern Central Europe, investigated by archaeo- and geoanthracological methods
• Wood in the Roman Age: cultural landscapes, forest exploitation and timber circulation
• The tell in the woods? Woodland-management and social differentiation of wood use at tell-sites in SE Europe and in Turkey

Palaeoecology,  project area: Holocene Fire History in Schleswig-Holstein (HolFiSH)

Micro- as well as macrocharcoal quantification from peat and lake sediment profiles is done aiming towards the reconstruction of Holocene fire history on a local and regional scale, in Schleswig-Holstein. This "sedimentary anthracology"-approach is combined with charcoal analysis incl. taxonomic identification from soil and soil sediment profiles ("pedoanthracology" or "geoanthracology"). Interpretation of identified fire events in the past is done in the context of landscape history of selected areas.

•  Holocene fire history in Northern Germany, inferred from peat and sediment charcoal records with various spatial resolution in selected areas of Schleswig-Holstein

Applied Ecology

• Earthworms in the Haseldorfer Marsch
• Experimental farming, riparian wetland carbon storage and bioindicators
• Biodiversity of key-taxa in the Pantanal: Database and Optimization of methods
• Development of a concept for sustainable preservation of beaches at the Baltic Sea coast
• Effects of green belts in ecological farming
• Strategies to minimise nutrient leaching from drained agricultural land
• Hydrological studies to accompany rewetting measures in the Upper Eider Valley
• Neotropical Osoriinae (only available in german)
• Mid-European flies
• Zertifizierung ökologischer Co-Benefits von CO2-Offsets für Moor-Wiedervernässung (only available in german)
• Phosphor in der Landwirtschaft – Management eines begrenzten Nährstoffs (only available in german)

Ecological Farming at Hof Ritzerau - Nature protection and agriculture at Hof Ritzerau farm
Component projects:

• Earthworms
  Space and time dynamics of earthworms during transitions to ecologolical farming methods
• Biodiversity
  Spatial and time-related distribution of ground and rove beetles
• Hydrology and functions of Lake Duven Creek bottomlands
  Investigations of the hydrology of a creek valley, using time-related high-resolution measurements (only available in german)