Prof. Dr. Damaris Zurell

Education

• 2011 – PhD in Geoecology, University of Potsdam, Inst. of Earth and Environmental Sciences
• 2007 – Diplom (M.Sc.) in Geoecology, University of Potsdam, Inst. of Geoecology

Academic career

• since 2020 – Professor of Ecology/Macroecology (tenure track), University of Potsdam
• 2018 - 2020 – Junior research group leader (DFG Emmy Noether programme), Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Geography Department
• 2016 - 2018 – Scientific staff member, Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL, Dept. Landscape Dynamics
• 2014 - 2016 – Postdoc, Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL, Dept. Landscape Dynamics
• 2011 - 2014 – PostDoc, University of Potsdam, Inst. for Biochemistry and Biology
• 2011 – PhD in Geoecology, University of Potsdam, Inst. of Earth and Environmental Sciences
• 2007 – Diplom (M.Sc.) in Geoecology, University of Potsdam, Inst. of Geoecology

Professional services

• Expert panel “Abiotic effects on biodiversity”, National Monitoring Centre Biodiversity, Germany (since 2021)
• Deputy Editor-in-Chief Journal of Biogeography (since 2021)
• Subject/Associate journal editor: Phil Trans B (Special Issue editor, 2022-2023), Ecography (2019-2022), Oikos (2018-2021), Diversity and Distributions (2016-2019), Journal of Biogeography (Special Issue editor, 2019)
• Recommender for PCI Ecology (since 2018)
• Commission member IUCN SSC Climate Change Specialist Group (since 2017)

Projects

Projects as main applicant

• 2023-2026 – DFG Individual Project Grant. “ DEBTs - Detecting and attributing biodiversity trends – a process-explicit modelling framework for identifying drivers of past and future population and community dynamics”.
• 2023-2026 – DFG Individual Project Grant. “ NichePac - Invaders on the move – niche and spread dynamics of introduced alien plants in the Pacific”.
• 2019-2020 – DAAD Programmes for project-related personal exchange. “RangeDyna - Moving from pattern towards process for improved forecasts of species range dynamics”. Exchange with Univ. Melbourne, Australia.
• 2018-2023 – DFG Emmy Noether junior research group, “BIOPIC – Disentangling the effects of demography, dispersal and biotic interactions in population and community response to global change”
• 2016-2019 – SNF Ambizione Fellowship, “SCODA – Scaling from individual interactions to community dynamics in avian assemblages”
• 2014-2016 – EU-FP7 Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowship (IEF), “MATES – Understanding and predicting multispecies assemblages and interactions in space and time”
• 2014 – University of Potsdam Individual Postdoc Grant “Bridge Programme”
• 2007-2010 – PhD Scholarship by the Potsdam Graduate School on Ecological Modelling UPGradE

Projects as co-applicant

• 2023-2026 – HORIZON-EUSPA-2021-SPACE. “ BirdWatch - A Copernicus-based service for the improvement of habitat suitability of farmland birds via satellite-enabled monitoring, evaluation and optimisation of CAP greening measures”. (Damaris is PI)
• 2022-2024 – ARC Discovery project (Univ. Melbourne). “Nature futures - Mapping pathways to prosperity for people and nature”. (Damaris is partner investigator)
• 2022-2025 – Leibniz Collaborative Excellence (MfN / HU Berlin). "BeyondSpecies - Predicting biodiversity change by integrating genetic diversity into ecological niche models". (Damaris is Co-PI and work package leader)
• 2020-2022 – Interdisciplinary project funded by Swiss Data Science Center SDSC, “COMECO - Combining machine learning, ecological modelling and plant morphological characteristics to develop a tool for identifying plants of Switzerland” (Damaris is co-PI)
• 2018-2020 – Interdisciplinary project funded by Swiss Data Science Center SDSC, “SPEEDMIND - Improving species biodiversity analyses and citizen science feedback through mining data” (Damaris is co-PI and work package leader)

Publications

see list of publications