INBO celebrates double PhD success and welcomes new FWO candidates in 2025
Both Charlotte Van Driessche and Garben Logghe recently successfully defended their INBO-FWO PhD theses.
- Charlotte obtained her PhD with a thesis entitled “Implementation of eDNA metabarcoding as an innovative tool for biomonitoring fish communities in lotic waters”. She investigated whether eDNA can be used to determine how many and which fish species are present in flowing water. Fish leave DNA traces in the water through their scales, mucus and excrement. By analysing these traces, we can discover which fish and fish communities live in our rivers and determine the water quality of our rivers.
- Garben obtained his PhD with a thesis entitled “Trait-based insights into terrestrial arthropod ecology and responses to global change”. In other words: how do arthropods – such as spiders, beetles and butterflies – spread in times of climate change and what can we learn from this for maintaining connectivity between habitats and protecting those areas?
In addition, ten candidates responded to the 2025 call for applications from the Research Foundation - Flanders (FWO) for pre-doctoral mandates with the INBO label. Eight of them subsequently defended their proposals in September. Five of them also passed this second and final selection round and are now getting to work:
- Merel Vandermeeren: ‘Optimising Dike Vegetation for Erosion Resistance and Biodiversity Conservation in the Scheldt Basin’ (KULeuven)
- Floris Meert: ‘Spatialising forest compensation: (re)negotiating urbanisation and nature development in Flanders’ (KULeuven)
- Frouke De Witte: ‘Integrating habitat suitability, population growth and movement ecology to advance forecasts of avian invasions’ (Ghent University)
- Kaat Thienpont: ‘Lost in the Flow: combining 3D fish tracking, hydraulic modelling, and flow pattern analysis to improve fishway findability’ (Ghent University, Hydraulics Laboratory)
- Imke Tomsin: ‘Towards a better integration of multi-species interactions into wildlife management decision-making’ (UHasselt)
Please feel free to contact Dirk Maes or Veronique Adriaenssens if you are interested in working on an INBO-FWO PhD based on our INBO research agenda.