The UnAMI working group unites researchers that encounter, or are working with, remains of understudied aquatic macroinvertebrates in their sediment samples. Researchers of contemporary aquatic macroinvertebrate fauna are very welcome, to discuss ecological properties and distribution of the organisms that they study.
Click here to Join the UnAMI (Understudied Aquatic Macroinvertebrate) working group email list
We are excited to see a variety of people from all parts of the world, and with interests ranging from Annelida to Trichoptera and from Bryozoa to Mollusca! Quite a few people who expressed their interest are studying contemporary ecology, and it will be interesting to see how the interaction between palaeoecologists and ecologists will develop.
There are various ways to organize and grow this group, and they will depend on your input and wishes as well. For our intended goal to create a platform where members can exchange information and ideas, we first need to correct a small mistake we made: to most of you, we did not ask for your consent to share your contact details.
If you are okay with sharing your email address, please fill it in our spreadsheet. If not, we will act as a liaison between you and anyone from the UnAMI working group who would like to contact you.
While it will take a few more weeks to find out if there will be a funded opportunity to meet in person, the group leadership would like to present themselves:
- Nick Schafstall is a palaeoecologist who obtained his PhD in Quaternary entomology in 2021. Currently, he is working as a researcher at the Nature Research Centre in Vilnius, Lithuania, where he reconstructs past landscapes and climate from Coleoptera and Trichoptera. He is looking for collaborations and resources to expand his knowledge on the different invertebrate groups he encounters in his lake and peat sediment samples.
- Daniel Vondrák is a palaeolimnologist and hydrobiologist who obtained his PhD in Environmental Studies in 2019. Currently he is working as a researcher at the Faculty of Science, Charles University in Prague, Czechia, where he reconstructs the history of Central European lakes. He is looking for collaborations on remains of different aquatic invertebrate groups he encounters in his lake sediment cores.
- Olga Antczak-Orlewska is an ECR (PhD since 2023) hydrobiologist and palaeoecologist. Her work at the University of Gdańsk, Poland, includes mainly tracking the history of freshwater ecosystems, Chironomidae-inferred palaeoclimatic reconstructions and human-environment interactions. She aims to develop and standardize methods of identification and application of aquatic macroinvertebrates subfossils.
We are very interested in your views on the working group. Maybe you got more inspired about this now that you see who else has signed up already. And hopefully, you will keep inviting colleagues to join, through this form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeN2B9uYjaiGD2IcNooN3crcXx6sJEE4ykTga-nX6p0mgKFWA/viewform
More information will follow soon.
Originally written by Dr. Nick Schafstall, State Scientific Research Institute Nature Research Centre, Vilnius, Lithuania