ERC grant

The European Research Council has awarded EUR 3.35 million “advanced” grant to Vojtech Novotny’s team at the Biology Centre of the Czech Academy of Sciences for the study of insects and their impact on forest vegetation. This research will build a global network of study sites in the Czech Republic, Japan, USA, Ghana, Panama and Papua New Guinea, in collaboration with the Smithsonian Institution, the Universities of South Bohemia, Minnesota, and Chiba, as well as local partners at each of the study sites.

How would forests entirely devoid of insects look like?And why most of insect species prefer life in tropical jungles to temperatezone forests? Questions asked by a curious child, perhaps, but also byinternational research team from the Czech Academy of Sciences, recentlysupported by the European Research Council to study forests all over the world,and build a new canopy crane in the rainforests of Papua New Guinea. The new project builds on the existing Centerfor Tropical Biology, further expanding its diverse team of researchers andstudents from 12 countries, and making Ceske Budejovice a prominent center oftropical ecology research.