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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences @pnas.org · 14/10/2026

One of the most-viewed PNAS articles in the last week is “Rewriting the history of the invasive spiny water flea in North America.” Explore the article here: ow.ly/yb2050ZXbfa For more trending articles, visit ow.ly/AJ3Q50ZXbfb.

Four-panel figure with map of Great Lakes basin, scatter plot of records over time, and line graphs showing sediment data and temperature trends.

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Danai Kontou @danai-kontou.bsky.social · 14/10/2026

Delighted to see so much interest in my PhD work with >1k views in 2 weeks! 🎉 Proud of the many years of curiosity-driven work that led to it and incredibly grateful to my co-authors & funders @ecochangegroup.bsky.social @camplantsci.bsky.social @peterhousecam.bsky.social @isotopesuk.bsky.social

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences @pnas.org · 06/10/2026

The European spiny water flea has reduced the diversity of native zooplankton by over 50%. A study finds it had been present in Canada for at least a century before first reports in the 1980s—and it may not have been introduced by humans. In PNAS: ow.ly/lkRK50ZV1nw

The spiny water flea, Bythotrephes longimanus.
CREDIT: NOAA Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Thanks @cbcradiocanada.bsky.social for having us on to discuss our latest work @pnas.org (www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...) Listen in here: www.cbc.ca/listen/live-...

cbc.ca

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

None of this work would have been possible without many helpers and funding from @ukri.org NSER @camplantsci.bsky.social @peterhousecam.bsky.social 🙏 11/11

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Of course, invasive species like Bythotrephes still need to be managed even if they arrived naturally somewhere. But rather than treating the symptom – that is, the invader itself – we should treat the cause of invasion. We think climate change may be involved, e.g. doi.org/10.1111/gcb.... 10/n

doi.org

Climate warming restructures an aquatic food web over 28 years

We provide rare evidence from nature of how long-term climate warming restructures food webs and their phenology. By analysing exceptionally long time series in an iconic European lake, we found pred...

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

All this matters because lots of money is spent on controlling the spread of Bythotrephes. But what if they are already everywhere and we just can't see them? It takes millions of animals before 1 individual is caught in a net, which is how most lakes are monitored. 9/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

You may think 1950 or 1880 doesn't seem *that* much earlier than the 1980s. But this is central Ontario, Canada. There were no canals or roads to transport animals inland, if they even arrived by ship. And Bythotrephes does not survive long outside water. How Bythotrephes arrived is a mystery🔎 8/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Although radiocarbon cannot give an exact date, it estimated the age of our fossils to between 1667 and 1950. We found a similar story with environmental DNA, detecting Bythotrephes in mud dated from the 1880s. All lines of evidence converged 📈 7/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

There are many reasons why fossils could end up in deep layers of sediment. The "smoking gun" would have to come from dating fossils directly rather than the mud around. So we set out to do this by collecting hundreds of tiny fossils for radiocarbon dating. 6/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

However, nobody has seen Bythotrephes in transoceanic ballast water despite inspection programs 🤔 In 2019, our co-authors also discovered fossils of Bythotrephes in sediment from a lake in central Ontario that was >350 years old 🤯 doi.org/10.1007/s109... 5/n

doi.org

Client Challenge

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

The widely accepted history of Bythotrephes is that it was introduced into Lake Ontario from Europe via the ballast waters of trans-Atlantic cargo ships in the early 1980s. It was then presumed to have spread throughout the Great Lakes basin. Some of the invaded lakes are below 👇 4/n

The spiny water flea has been reported in more than 300 lakes in Canada and the U.S. since being first recorded in Lake Ontario in 1982. Red circles mark individual records of the species. Dark colours mark older records starting in the 1980s and lighter colours mark recent records from the 2020s.

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

By eliminating zooplankton grazers that control algal populations, Bythotrephes can even reduce water clarity. The cost of this damage was estimated at between US$87-$163 million per lake in this excellent study: doi.org/10.1073/pnas... 3/n

doi.org

Invasive species triggers a massive loss of ecosystem services through a trophic cascade | PNAS

Despite growing recognition of the importance of ecosystem services and the economic and ecological harm caused by invasive species, linkages betwe...

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Meet the spiny water flea Bythotrephes. It is one of the most damaging invasive species in North American freshwaters 🌊 It is a voracious predator that decimates native plankton populations and displaces other predators including fish 🐟 2/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Very proud of our newest paper now @pnas.org led by @danai-kontou.bsky.social @camplantsci.bsky.social with @laurentianu.bsky.social @isotopesuk.bsky.social Queens U. It's perhaps one of the most genuine "discoveries" we've ever made 🔬 Read it for free 👉 doi.org/10.1073/pnas... 🧵

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Danai Kontou @danai-kontou.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

This study was possible thanks to the support and dedication of my amazing co-authors from @trentuniversity.bsky.social, @laurentianu.bsky.social, @isotopesuk.bsky.social as well as @Queen's University 🩵

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Danai Kontou @danai-kontou.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

It is a great example showcasing the complexities of establishing timelines of species invasions and the role of global climate change in facilitating rapid population growth and high impact of damaging aquatic species.

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Danai Kontou @danai-kontou.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

In a bit of a "plot twist" we provide evidence that the #spiny #waterflea, one of North America's most notorious invasive species has actually been around for at least a century before its first detection in Lake Ontario in 1982! This was the most surprising and significant finding of my PhD.

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Danai Kontou @danai-kontou.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Some exciting weekend reading for my fellow #aquatic #invasion #ecology enthusiasts 🐠🦠💧 Delighted and very proud to share not 1 but 2 papers published hours apart this week! 🎉🎉🎉

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Erik Emilson @waterik.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Today we visited the beautiful and historic Petawawa Research Forest. We are setting up an exciting new forested lake study with colleagues @ecochangegroup.bsky.social and Nick fully immersed himself in it all 🙌

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Andrew Barnes @barnesecodiv.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

The take-home message: the consequences of biodiversity loss are deeply dependent on the architecture of food webs. Protecting ecosystem functioning requires conserving not only species richness, but also food-web complexity.

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Andrew Barnes @barnesecodiv.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

We found that predation increases disproportionately with biodiversity. Species-rich food webs with more trophically dissimilar (unique) predators support higher predation fluxes, highlighting the importance of conserving top consumers and the ecological functions they provide.

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Andrew Barnes @barnesecodiv.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

A key result is that biodiversity effects are mediated by food-web structure. More diverse food webs support greater vertical diversity (more trophic levels) and higher trophic complementarity among consumers, both of which increase energy flow through ecosystems, especially via predation.

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Andrew Barnes @barnesecodiv.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

Our paper has just been published in the latest issue of @nature.com! We analysed 318 food webs spanning marine, freshwater & soil ecosystems worldwide & found that ecosystem functioning increases consistently with biodiversity across multiple trophic levels. 🌐🧪🕷️🦠🍄🌿 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

nature.com

Food web complexity underlies biodiversity effects on ecosystem functioning - Nature

Analyses of the relationship between taxon richness and multi-trophic ecosystem functioning across marine, lake, stream and soil ecosystems show that food web complexity underlies biodiversity effects...

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Andrew Barnes @barnesecodiv.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

Published today in @nature.com, our study shows that the #foodweb trophic structure is critical for #ecosystemfunctioning. Read it here: rdcu.be/frxEl This has been an incredibly rewarding collaboration with many amazing scientists! 🌐🧪🦑🍁🌱 @waikatouniversity.bsky.social @idiv-research.bsky.social

Geographic distribution of the 318 food webs across four ecosystem types that were analysed to test how food web architecture modulates BEF relationships

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

Methane remains one of the most important greenhouse gases to model. 🖥️ Our study suggests that if we know about litter inputs to lakes, we can predict redox potential and use it to improve the accuracy of methane fluxes in global Earth system models. 🌊☁️🌍 8/8

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

At low concentrations, microbes may not suffer from toxic effects of polyphenolics and may even be able to use them as a substrate. The types of microbes we found in our study support this explanation and we devised a new way to identify them using @nanoporetech.com sequencing. 7/n

Methanogen composition in littoral lake sediments. a Relative abundance of reads and b number of unique taxa that could be mapped to the family-level in each of 19 sites across the northern UK. Families were classified into whether they can undertake a
acetoclastic, h hydrogenotrophic, or m methylotrophic methanogenesis (after Liu and Whitman 2008; Ellenbogen and others 2023). c Relative abundance across all reads (n = 1795) mapped to a mcrA sequence in each site. Rows are individual taxa sorted from those present in the most (top) to fewest (bottom) sites, with colours corresponding to relative abundance. We correlated the relative abundance of each taxon with diffusive CH4 fluxes across sites and
plotted correlations that were statistically significant (p < 0.05). NCBI GenBank accession numbers corresponding to each row are given in Data S1.

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

A key differences with our study was how low polyphenolic concentrations were. We only found two other studies that have measured these before in natural lake sediments but ours were much less than expected from plant litter inputs. 6/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

Unlike in our original lab experiment, methane fluxes increased with polyphenolic concentrations. We found polyphenolics were correlated with lower reduction-oxidation conditions that favour methane-producing microbes. 5/n

Drivers of littoral methane gas emissions. Diffusive CH4 fluxes per m2 of sediment increased with a polyphenolic concentrations expressed in gallic acid equivalents (GAE) per g dry weight of sediment in the best supported path analyses P1 and P2 (Figure 3, Table S2). This association was predicted to arise because b higher polyphenolic concentrations reduced oxidation reduction potential (ORP). c Lower ORP can directly change the electrochemical favourability of reactions involved in methanogenesis, as predicted by P1. d Lower ORP can also indirectly impact CH4 fluxes by changing methanogen composition, as predicted by P2 and measured by the first axis of a principal coordinates analysis (PCoA). e CH4 fluxes then proximally increased with larger PCoA scores, which reflected compositional shifts towards methanogens that were individually and positively correlated with CH4 fluxes (Figure S2). Points are site-level model predictions with fit (R2).

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

We compared the importance of polyphenolics for methane emissions with other environmental factors ☀️and microbial communities🦠. We discovered polyphenolics predicted methane emissions from the nearshore of lakes better than these other factors. But there was a twist! 4/n

Sediment chemistry mainly controls littoral greenhouse gas emissions. We tested six predictions (P1) to (P6) to explain diffusive CH4 and CO2 fluxes measured across 19 littoral sites. For clarity, we plot only the best supported predictions (P1) and (P2) based on AICc (Table S2); all predictions are plotted in Figure S4. Dashed boxes group variables
associated with each prediction. Shading of boxes and text correspond to model support, with darker colours indicating greater support (Table S2). Predictions were separately modelled using path analysis and test if fluxes were associated with sediment chemistry, including percent organic matter in sediment (%OM) and sediment polyphenolic concentrations (polyphenols), and methanogen (mcrA) composition (comp). All models included climate, including water temperature
(temp), and other environmental variables, e.g. dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentrations and organic matter quality in porewater measured by specific ultraviolet absorbance (SUVA). Arrows point at modelled variables, with their sizes proportional to the mean effect of one variable on another estimated by path analysis and colours corresponding with direction of effect. R2 values and effect sizes plotted for predictors included in all models (i.e. climate and environment) were from the model with lowest AICc (Table S2).

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

In 2018, we travelled Scotland and northern England, measuring greenhouse gas fluxes from majestic and iconic lakes like Loch Ness. 3/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

In a previous paper (www.nature.com/articles/s41...), we discovered polyphenolics act like a latch that stops microbes from producing methane and help store carbon. With @royalsociety.org funding 🙏, we set out to test this idea in nature. 2/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

Thrilled our latest paper is finally online @springernature.com 😀 You can read it for free 👇 link.springer.com/article/10.1... This study was a long time coming @camplantsci.bsky.social. We uncover why nearshore zones of lakes emit large amounts of the greenhouse gas methane. 1/n 🧵

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 16/11/2025

Last week, we were privileged to be awarded the President‘s International Fellowship for Distinguished Scientists (formerly the Einstein Professorship) by the Chinese Academy of Sciences. 🥼🧑‍🔬 Grateful for the opportunity to visit and strengthen collaborations.

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 11/11/2025

These findings suggest wildfires may result in larger carbon losses from land than expected, especially when scaled over the vast areas of forest burned annually. 🚨 Important for climate change 🚨 Grateful for support from NRCan, NSERC, and the ERC. 3/3

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 11/11/2025

Using a natural experiment pairing burned and unburned forests, we found wildfire increased carbon concentrations in headwater streams by nearly 30%. This carbon was as favourable for microbial degradation as that in unburned streams!🦠 2/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 11/11/2025

🔥Wildfires are growing in frequency and intensity worldwide. How do they affect the flow of carbon from forests into downstream waters? 🌳🌊 Our new paper @jgrbiogeo.bsky.social with @waterik.bsky.social @ecfreewoman.bsky.social now online to read: dx.doi.org/10.1029/2025... 🧵1/n

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

Last week we were privileged to showcase our research twice alongside some of Canada’s finest scientists. 🥼 🇨🇦 Grateful to NSERC and the Killam Trusts for their support!

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 09/11/2025

These findings indicate that the ocean plays a larger role in long-term terrestrial carbon sequestration than previously appreciated and call for a reassessment of global carbon budgets and models. 🌊🌏 3/3

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 09/11/2025

Using novel analytical chemistry approaches, we identify new markers of terrestrial carbon. We estimate that the terrestrial contribution to the oceanic carbon pool may be several times larger than recognised. 2/3

The properties of MF with similar isomeric composition from the YRE to ECS as determined by HPLC-Orbitrap MS. (A) Van Krevelen diagram of MFs. Gray dots represent the MF having similar structures but without bio- and photoresistant properties, whereas blue and black dots represent MF with bio- and photoresistant properties, denoted as Terr-MFs, that contain elements of C, H, O and C, H, O, N, and (B) The number percentage of MF classified as Terr-MFs and non-Terr-MFs based on bio- and photoresistant properties in incubation experiments, and the percentage of Terr-MFs further classified as CRAM and IOS, and no t-Peaks were found in the Terr-MFs.

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 09/11/2025

👏 Thrilled to see this paper online @pnas.org. One of the biggest mysteries in marine science is how much terrestrial organic matter is in the oceanic carbon pool. 🤔 We address this question here! Read the paper 👉 www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1... 🧵1/3

Conceptual model of terrestrial DOM transport from land to ocean. Red text indicates the range of flux and apparent age of terrestrial DOM estimated in this study.

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 01/11/2025

This week, Andrew was on CBC radio to discuss our research 🥼🧪 and an exciting new award. You can listen 👉 www.cbc.ca/listen/live-...

cbc.ca

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Reposted by Ecosystems and Global Change Group

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences @pnas.org · 18/09/2025

Logging changes the composition of the organic matter in nearby streams, making the organic matter more reactive. According to the authors, these changes are enough to flip logging from a carbon-sink to carbon-neutral or even a carbon-source. In PNAS: www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1...

Dissolved organic matter concentrations were elevated in streams of the harvest relative to the control sites immediately after logging.

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 19/09/2025

Great story by about our research with @waterik.bsky.social. Read more 👉 www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

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Ecosystems and Global Change Group @ecochangegroup.bsky.social · 08/09/2025

Grateful that our group could contribute to this fantastic work! Includes the work of @camplantsci.bsky.social undergrads. 🤩

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