Diploma (Biology) 1974: University of Hamburg
Dissertation (Biology) 1979: University of Bremen
Senior scientist and lecturer in the Department  of Biology / ICBM since 1979

After the death of the late Professor Vareschi, I became acting head of the Aquatic Ecology Group of the ICBM. My main research interest is the development of concepts and procedures to assess the bioaccumulation of heavy metals in aquatic organisms, especially in marine and estuarine zooplankton and zoobenthos from different areas of the world (e.g. North Sea, Greenland Sea and the Antarctic Ocean). Of particular importance is the development of comparative predictive toxicokinetic models for the uptake and depuration of metals in organisms. These methods have proven to be an adequate tool for the calibration of potential biomonitors, which is an inevitable precondition to assess the bioavailability of metals in different waters on large geographical and time scales. Furthermore, I am interested in the spatial analysis of environmental data, for example, in the context of fisheries science (in cooperation with Dr. Vanessa Stelzenmüller, CEFAS). A sound spatial analysis, for example employing geostatistics, allows more reliable stock estimates and related variances, taking into account possible spatial autocorrelations. Finally I am involved in various applied hydrobiological studies, in cooperation with local authorities or consultants, e.g. regarding oxygen conditions in the River Ems in the context of a recently constructed barrier.

In all these fields several Ph.D. and Diploma theses were completed. Many international and national co operations were established in order to improve our conceptual and technical expertise. These include the Nikolaou Copernicus University Torún (Poland), the Murmansk Marine Biological Institute (Russia), Akvaplan-niva, APN and the Norwegian College of Fishery Science (Tromsö, Norway), the Marine Labora­tory,  Plymouth (UK), the Ocean University of Qingdao (China), the Institut de Ciències del Mar, CSIC, Psg. Marítim de la Barceloneta (Spain), the Centre of Environment, Fisheries & Aquaculture Science, CEFAS (Lowstoft, UK) and the Institute of Sea Fisheries, Hamburg (Germany). Furthermore, I took part in several cruises on board German research vessels such as Meteor, Polarstern and Walther Herwig III to the North Sea, the Greenland Sea, the Weddell Sea and to the Iberian Deep Sea Plain.

Apart from the research activities I am responsible for the modules "Introduction to  Ecology" and “Applied statistics in biology and environmental science” in the BSc studies of biology and environmental science.

• Click here for a complete list of publications and congress contributions 
• Click here for a complete list of supervised theses (in German) 
• Click here for a complete list of co operations (in German) 
• Click here for a complete list of research cruises (in German) 
• Click here for contributed pictures to FishBase