Dries Bonte

Dries Bonte is professor in ecology and evolution at Ghent University. He leads his ‘Spatial Ecology and Evolution’ research group at the Terrestrial Ecology Unit and is editor-in-chief of Oikos – a journal for synthesis in ecology.

His research includes:

• Dispersal and movement ecology
• Evolution in spatially structured environments and its impact on ecological processes
• Plant-arthropod interactions
• Self-organisation of coastal dunes and resilience against climate change

He uses arthropods -and especially arachnids- as a biological model,  and combines experimental approaches with modelling to gain a firm understanding on how habitat fragmentation, climate change and urbanisation affect biodiversity at multiple levels of biological organisation.