Elisa Männistö

All living things are adapting to the constantly changing world, and I as a biologist am interested in understanding how. Currently, I am intrigued by ecology of peatland ecosystems that are tightly linked to the ongoing climate change. In my PhD project, I study the spatial and temporal variation of methane and biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOC) emissions in boreal peatland ecosystems. These gases have an important role in climate regulation, as methane is a potent climate warming greenhouse gas and BVOCs can have both climate warming and cooling effects. The objects of my research are

• to uncover the links between both methane and BVOC emissions and peatland vegetation (variation in space).
• to study the variation in methane and BVOC fluxes over growing season and between different years (variation in time).
• to quantify how decreasing water level changes the BVOC emissions from the Sphagnum mosses, in a greenhouse experiment.