Author: Mariana Verdonen

Prof. Elisabeth Cooper is a plant ecologist based in Tromsø at UiT- The Arctic University of Norway. She studies plant- and tundra ecosystems responses to climate. She runs a long-term experiment on Svalbard to find out more about the role of snow and changes in winter conditions for tundra ecology. She has previously worked at UNIS in Longyearbyen and Norwegian Polar Institute in Tromsø and is an active member of the International Tundra Experiment (ITEX) network.

Tom has started his position as a postdoctoral fellow at the NTNU in Trondheim. In this role, he will be taking over the coordinating responsibilities of the NordBorN network, allowing Mariana Verdonen to focus more on her research during the final months of her contract.

Tom completed his PhD at the University of Vienna, Austria, where his work focused on modelling biological invasions in the sub-Antarctic region. He assessed the risk that plant invasions pose for these isolated islands under climate change, and how their past and current shipping network links them to potential alien plants on the mainland. Prior to this, he worked in the Austrian Alps documenting the distribution of alien plant species along rivers and roads, as well as conducting ethnobotanical research on the famine food consumed during the Dutch famine of 1944-45. He is interested in polar and alpine flora, biological invasions, history, and species dynamics under climate change.