Past awards – Research Grants

Spring 2023

Small Research (20)

• Fountain of youth? Exploring the use of artificial reefs to encourage restored juvenile mussel survival
• Understanding primate distribution, behaviour and human interactions through focus-group interviews inside and outside protected areas in Guinea-Bissau.
• Synthesizing the mechanisms of stressor interactions in freshwater ecosystems using natural language processing and an interactive database.
• Multispectral plant metabolome indexes to assess grassland responses to multiple disturbances
• In the shadow of big cats: how intraguild interactions and anthropogenic pressures influence medium carnivores in East African savannahs.
• Inferring the evolutionary drivers of richness, assembly, and diversification patterns of woody plants in the Western Ghats, India
• GIANTS: Disentangling how dinosaurian megaherbivores ruled their ecosystems
• Determining the foraging tactics of the Saharan horned viper
• Impacts of triazole consumption on health, reproductive success and immunocompetence of passerine birds.
• Epigenetic and dietary diversity in Alaskan coastal wolves: Harnessing DNA methylation to help delineate conservation units in North American wolf populations
• An endangered scavenger as a health regulator for Andean páramo ecosystem
• Restoring functional ecosystems: the reassembly of seed dispersal networks over a time-since recovery chronosequence in the Chocó Rainforest of Northwest Ecuador
• Characterization of color variation and mesophotic Paramuricea clavata assemblages
• Applying a bioacoustic framework to monitor and improve the conservation of amphibians in
• Tobago, a Small Island Developing State with high amphibian endemism
• Seeds of (Global) Change: Impact of four global change drivers on seed and dispersal traits
  Susceptibility of black bream to climate warming: Considerations of body size and populations
• Fire-flooding Interactions in Parque Nacional Da Gorongosa, Mozambique
• Linking intraspecific trait variation to eco-evolutionary dynamics of Daphnia populations
• Wildfire impacts on freshwater ecosystems in Canada
• Time-dependent effects of plant-microbe interactions

Large Research (6)

• Historic population structure and foraging ecology of fin whales in the North Atlantic during the industrial revolution
• The social dynamics of archerfish in the wild
• Do cleaner fish help buffer against coral reef degradation?
• Community Structure and Activity Pattern of Bats Along a Gradient of Landscape Composition in Central Regions of Kenya
• Consequences of night-time climate warming on leaf respiration in tropical forests (TropResp).
• Sowing the spores of sustainability: Linking fungal community ecology and functional outcomes to promote sustainable crop production

Spring 2022

Small Research (11)

• A dead giveaway: Experimentally simulating the effect of apex scavenger presence on small carnivores and ecosystem function in a recovering African savanna
• Does faster metamorphosis lead to poorer microbiome? The case of amphibian populations under drought stress.
• Ecology and Conservation status of an endemic and highly threatened lizard (Lacertaspis lepesmei) in Mount Bamboutos, Cameroon.
• Ecosystem dynamics, animal movements, and the energetic footprint of marine consumers
• Exploring the effects of fire severity on ecosystem multifunctionality in fire-prone landscapes
• Genetic diversity as a driver of centre-periphery dynamics for a tropical plant, Thunbergia atacorensis
• Interactions at the edge: how soil microbes shape plant coexistence in tropical forest fragments
• Restoration with Optical Seed Assemblages (ROSA)
• Testing the purodiversity-biodiversity hypothesis in central Madagascar grasslands
• TimeCapsule – studying rapid evolution of selfing syndrome in plants using resurrection ecology
• Wild Soundscape Research 2022

Autumn 2021

Small Research (14)

• Ecological Survey of Freshwater Macroinvertebrates and Freshwater-dependent Odonatans in the Nigeria-Cameroon Border and Biodiversity Hotspots.
• Determining allocation to anti-herbivore silicon versus Epichloë-endophyte defences using an established native grass common garden – synergy or trade-off?
• Seasonal variation of the bobtail squid Sepiola atlantica bacterial ratio and in response to marine heatwaves.
• The importance of baselines in phase-shifts: comparison of historic and current macroalgal dynamics on the Great Barrier Reef.
• Topographic analysis as a tool for ecological and functional classification of shark scales.
• Dormant immunity – investigation of active immune expression and function during bumblebee queen diapause.
• Filter bridge and local factor’s role in shaping chironomid assemblages; a study in pristine tropical streams along a biogeographical transition.
• Population Dynamics of Feral Hemp (Cannabis sativa L.) across Illinois.
• Heterocyst counts as an alternative, low-cost method for assessing biological nitrogen fixation by tropical lichens.
• Exploring the threat of the invasive Paper Mulberry on timber-producing forests in Ghana.
• Cataloguing and Digitising the University of Sheffield Herbarium.
• Feeding preferences and nutritional profile of shell-less clams (Teredinidae).
• Testing the plasticity of cave adaptations: Characterization of the web architecture of an exclusively epigean Meta spider.
• Spatial ecology of territorial species and its consequences for metapopulation dynamics.

Large Research (3)

• How do high temperatures influence prey consumption by an endangered African carnivore?
• Energy efficiency during early life: exploring the role of mitochondrial efficiency as an adaptation to a warming world in Brown trout.
• A trait-based approach to investigate the effects of roadside verges on pollinator biodiversity and on ecosystem function.

Spring 2021

Small Research (13)

• Statistical models for relative abundance in species-rich communities.
• Forest recovery over 47 years after bauxite mining.
• Species-specific soil modification by ectomycorrhizal fungi.
• Could climate-driven changes in breeding phenology explain the declines in abundance of fin whales (Balenoptera physalus) in the northwest Atlantic?
• Algae Attacks! Method and consequences of Cladoceran brood chamber colonisation by a microplankton.
• MethaneTraits – Assessing plant functional traits as determinants of tree stem methane fluxes.
• Reconciling urban bat conservation and public accessibility: ‘bat-friendly’ lighting in UK parkland.
• Automated audio detection and monitoring of birds in Galápagos.
• Plasticity of dominant boreal conifers to warming temperatures and thawing permafrost.
• The role of hybridisation in the rapid range expansion of wall lizards in Switzerland.
• Effects of local and landscape-scale habitat attributes on the use of golf courses by bats.
• Improving our understanding of biodiversity trends by collecting data in multiple languages.
• More siliceous but less nutritious: is this a tactic for legumes to anticipate future attacks?

Large Research (3)

• Unravelling the extent and impacts of plant invasion in the last pristine landscapes of Europe: linking monitoring and conservation management.
• Physiological and cognitive responses of fishes and cephalopods to hypoxia.
• Escalating effects of multiple perturbations on soil biodiversity and function.

Autumn 2020

Small Research (13)

• Paleoecology translated for modern management: calibrating pollen-vegetation relationships for understanding woody vegetation change through time in African savannas.
• Signature Whistles for Occurrence, Recapture and Density – Developing the SWORD method for Namibian Coastal Bottlenose Dolphins.
• Distribution Pattern and Conservation Status of two poorly known and endemic lizards of Nigeria – Cynisca gansi and Cynisca kigomensis.
• Population structure and conservation of the endangered Great Green Macaw.
• Disentangling seasonal and reproductive status effects on trophic interactions of European Free-tailed bats.
• Diversity of migration in European Blackcaps Sylvia atricapilla.
• Doomed to fail? Describing the extent of species reintroductions that have succumbed to negative climate change.
• The SPOT Project: Sponge-Plastic-Oil-Temperature.
• Social Effects on the Transmission and Acquisition of Gut Microbiota.
• Impact of demographic history and recent population dynamics on inbreeding in coastal bottlenose dolphins.
• Gecko Adaptation to Surface Textures in Mauritius.
• Role of local evolutionary history on tropical forest diversity and functioning.
• eDNA fragment lengths across different biomes.

Large Research (3)

• Drivers of Animal Life-History Decisions in a Changing World.
• Heat waves: is butterfly fertility affected? A transgenerational field trial in Pieris brassicae.
• Landscape effects on endosymbionts of the Cabbage stem flea beetle Psylliodes chrysocephala.

Spring 2020

Small Research (14)

• DNA based tools to understand diet and its role in community assembly for a group of endemic island beetles.
• Finding fungal friends for a fight: How do different mycorrhizal fungal communities alter plant defenses?
• A Toolkit for Ageing Wild Animals.
• Drivers of gut microbiome and parasite community assemblage in Chernobyl’s Przewalski horses.
• Solving the Last Great Bird Mystery.
• Flying with the seasons: a population genomic analysis of seasonal migration in Amazonian butterflies.
• Circulation of infectious agents in the world population of an endangered penguin and implications for conservation.
• Is mate choice in amphibians MHC dependent?
• Blowing in the wind: Dust dispersal and microbial meta-communities in a semi-arid landscape.
• Tundra vegetation response to recent climate warming.
• ISLANDER: Island Sustainability: the Legacy of Anthropogenic and Natural Disturbance on Ecological Resources.
• Does genome size limit plant growth rate under nutrient limitation?
• Testing invasive species management models: can you trust your model?
• Early-life physiology and range limits: investigating the mechanisms underlying adaptation to climate in the delicate skink.

Large Research (3)

• Global perspectives on termite functional biogeography.
• Measuring carbon stocks and fluxes across a successional gradient in Sundarbans – the world’s largest mangrove forest.
• Effects of multiple disturbances on plant community functional composition: A quantitative review.