Despite many counter measures, the number of collisions between aircrafts and birds (bird-strikes) has increased in the past decades. Annually the strikes cost civil aviation (disregarding military aviation) worldwide over 1 billion Euros. Particularly the multiple collisions during strikes with bird flocks lead to engine failure. Unfortunately, flocks are difficult to control. As a solution, the proposed project aims to develop a method of using robot-falcons, so-called RoboFalcons, to chase away flocks of birds. Exploiting the synergy between RoboFalcon experiments, computer-modeling and observational data, the project will deliver a prototype of an easily steerable RoboFalcon and a protocol for how to drive away flocks of birds.

A major challenge in ecology is the need for a better theoretical framework for understanding how species assemblages (ecological communities) arise, why some are species-rich and others species-poor, and why some species are present or dominant whereas others are not. Current community assembly theory is largely based on static models. However, ecological dynamics (e.g. ecological drift, competition, immigration), or evolutionary dynamics (e.g. genetic drift, natural selection, speciation) generate continual changes in the constituents of communities and the sources from which they are assembled. The dynamical models that do exist do not take the community perspective or do not readily allow inferences from data. Moreover, there is often a mismatch between models and data. I propose to solve these problems simultaneously by developing a fully stochastic, dynamical and data-friendly theory of community assembly, and testing and informing this theory with model-oriented experiments and field studies of both macro-organisms and micro-organisms. The theory will contain models of speciation, extinction, immigration and demographic change that vary in spatial, phylogenetic and biotic complexity, and which I will design for confrontation with data by providing each model?s likelihood given the data. I will conduct evolutionary experiments on the mite Tetranychus urticae and the bacterium Escherichia coli, which are ideal model organisms due to their short generation times. The experiments will provide insight into how diversity affects diversification, a great unknown in current macro-evolutionary theory. Apart from these highly controlled experiments, I will apply the theory to naturally occurring microlandsnails in South-East Asia, and micro-organisms in geothermal pools in New Zealand. Their small size, endemism and spatially limited, discrete habitat create a miniature world that facilitates sampling and confrontation with models. The proposed research will provide software tools for scientists and conservationists to assess the processes underlying natural communities and predict their future composition and diversity.

Telomeres are DNA/protein structures at the ends of chromosomes that shorten with age. Evidence is accumulating that telomere length is a biomarker of aging, providing a possible key towards understanding the enigma of aging, but the evidence is largely non-experimental. We will study telomeres in relation to aging and life history using an experimental approach in wild birds (jackdaws), which are exposed to natural selection pressures absent from laboratory settings. We have successfully modulated actuarial senescence (=increase of mortality rate with age) by inducing a change in reproductive effort through brood size manipulation, i.e. decreasing or increasing the number of young in the nest. This experiment also affected nestling development, but in a sex-dependent way: growth of daughters was more affected than growth of sons, but only in sons was there an effect on telomeres. Furthermore, the telomere shortening in nestlings was fast enough to allow longitudinal comparisons within weeks, while in humans this takes years. These findings create a unique opportunity to simultaneously test: (i) Whether the induced acceleration of actuarial senescence can be attributed to accelerated physiological aging, using telomere shortening as biomarker. (ii) Whether telomere dynamics in nestlings constitutes a biomarker that links developmental conditions to success later in life, and how this depends on sex. (iii) Candidate physiological causes of telomere shortening, exploiting the high rate of telomere shortening in nestlings. Through this experimental work in an ecologically relevant setting we will make a unique contribution to our understanding of telomeres, life histories and aging.

Around the globe, agricultural areas are endangered by an increase of salts in the soil. This salinization reduces the yield and nutritional quality of crops grown in these areas, which poses a serious threat to our food supply. This project investigates how metabolic substances in plants can be used to increase the resistance of important crops to salinization. The results will help to develop new crop varieties that can withstand current and future climate-driven stressors to enable sustainable crop production and ensure food security.

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