Inter-Research
International Ecology Institute

IRPE Prize

IRPE laurates are elected by a jury composed of ECI Members.

IRPE Laureates and Their Major Scientific Achievements

Karel Simek (Hydrobiological Institute, Czech Academy of Sciences, 370 05 Ceské Budejovice, Czech Republic), IRPE Prize winner 1991 in limnetic ecology.
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: Jürgen Overbeck, Plön, Germany):
Dr. Karel Simek belongs to the generation of young limnologists in Eastern Europe who - despite lack of international information exchange - published, under difficult conditions, excellent contributions to the field of Aquatic Microbiology. He enjoys a high international reputation. Under the present, improved conditions Simek is likely to proceed even more successfully to new professional horizons.

Richard K. Grosberg (Department of Zoology, University of California, Davis, CA 95616, USA), IRPE Prize winner 1992 in marine ecology.
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: John Costlow, Beaufort, NC, USA):
Richard K. Grosberg has not only published extensively on fundamental issues relating to marine ecology, but has also demonstrated his understanding of marine ecology through superb teaching of invertebrate zoology to undergraduate and graduate students. He is acknowledged as a leader in adapting molecular techniques for the study of marine larvae and in developing information on extraordinarily detailed mapping studies of the genetic structure of adult populations of marine organisms.

Nikolai V. Aladin (Zoological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg 199034, Russia), IRPE Prize winner 1993 in terrestrial ecology.
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: Harold A. Mooney, Stanford, CA, USA):
Dr. Nikolai V. Aladin is one of Russia's most eminent young ecologists. He has researched environments in the former Soviet Union, particularly in Kazakhstan where he and a small team have focussed upon the area of the Aral Sea. Dr. Aladin's studies were performed during a period of change, both in the patterns of organismic assemblages and in the political structure of his country. These studies were undertaken in his own time and at his own expense. It is only over the past few years that his studies have been officially supported and their value recognized.

Stephen J. Hawkins (Centre of Environmental Sciences, University of Southampton, United Kingdom), IRPE Prize winner 1995 in marine ecology.
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: Ernest Naylor, Menai Bridge, UK):
At the start of his research career Stephen Hawkins resisted pressures to work on topics for which funding was known to be available, preferring to develop his own ideas and to be judged on those. It was a brave stance when trying to formulate a Ph.D. programme in a harsh financial climate, but he was successful and began imaginative field experiments on rocky shore communities to test his ideas on species/area concepts and on the temporal basis of mosaic distributions. He followed these with detailed studies of intertidal gastropods as models for ideas on niche theory and competition. The outcome of his work has been to generate important new insights into quantitative sampling techniques and environmental impact assessments of rocky shore communities.

Susan Harrison (Division of Environmental Studies, University of California, Davis, CA 95616, USA), IRPE Prize winner 1996 in terrestrial ecology.
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: Ilkka Hanski, Helsinki, Finland):
Susan Harrison has made distinguished contributions to population ecology and conservation biology. Her Ph.D. research on the Edith's checkerspot butterfly has had a major impact on the way ecologists think about spatially structured populations. Her more recent empirical research has tested intriguing theoretical predictions about the spatial dynamics of animal and plant populations. Susan Harrison has been exceptionally influential in clarifying and interpreting the implications of population biological research to conservation.

Jef Huisman (Department of Biological Sciences, Gilbert Hall, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA), IRPE Prize winner 1997 in limnetic ecology.
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: Winfried Lampert, Plön, Germany):
Jef Huisman has made significant contributions to resource competition theory. Through a unique blend of theory and elegant experiments, he has included light as a resource into the framework of Tilman's mechanistic competition models. Light is a unique resource as it cannot be intermixed like nutrients. Models of light-limited growth and competition, therefore, require a vertical light gradient and a 'critical light intensity' for different species. Jef Huisman has developed the existing theory further and has discovered that not only the ratio of nutrients and light determines the outcome of competition, but also the absolute supply. This outstanding work will have a strong influence on general ecological theory.

Philip Boyd (NIWA Centre for Chemical and Physical Oceanography, Department of Chemistry, University of Otago, Dunedin 9001, New Zealand), IRPE Prize winner 1998 in marine ecology.
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: B.-O. Jansson, Stockholm, Sweden):
Dr. Philip Boyd is an internationally acknowledged authority in the fields of phytoplankton community dynamics and oceanic productivity. His thesis 'The flow of carbon in marine microbial ecosystems' provided him with a broad base for launching his scientific career. From postdoctoral positions in the UK and Canada and from his present position in New Zealand he has participated in and contributed significantly to the international Joint Global Ocean Flux Study. His work on the relationship between sinking flux and pelagic community composition is truly interdisiplinary as it links pelagic ecology with marine geochemisty. Throughout his career he has been involved in large-scale field measurements of the open ocean that have applied methods and techniques ranging from molecular biology to ocean physics. He has collaborated with leading scientists and with great success amalgamated complex data sets and modelled major processes from photosynthesis to sinking flux. Currently Boyd has taken up the challenge of organising and leading the first iron fertilisation experiment to test the iron hypothesis in the Southern Ocean. Since this is the first joint South African - New Zealand scientific undertaking its significance for ocean ecology is complemented by its political dimension. Indeed a heavy burden to be carried by a young scientist!

Kevin J. Gaston (Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2NT, United Kingdom), IRPE Prize winner 1999 in terrestrial ecology
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: F.A. Bazzaz, Cambridge, Massachusetts):
Dr. Kevin J. Gaston has played a major role in the development of macroecology and biodiversity. He established the existence of several major macroecological patterns in insect assemblages. His thesis (which appeared as a series of papers in Nature, Journal of Animal Ecology, American Naturalist and Oikos) clearly demonstrated the need for a macroecological viewpoint. Since then Dr. Gaston has sought to determine the generality of a wide diversity of patterns in macroecology, the fundamental structure of these patterns, the mechanisms which generate them, and their wider implications. Features of these studies have been the development of appropriate statistical tools, the use of null models, and a drive to distinguish real ecological patterns from artefacts and to establish the fundamental mechanisms which cause the real patterns. A number of macroecological hypotheses have been tested for the first time, and others have been subject to more detailed scrutiny than had previously been the case. He has challenged our thinking about the form of macroecological patterns (e.g. measurement of population variability) and their determinants (e.g. abundance-occupancy relationships). This has resulted in stimulating debates

Ruben Sommaruga (Institute of Zoology and Limnology, University of Innsbruck, Technikerstr. 25, 6020 Innsbruck), IRPE Prize winner 2000 in limnetic ecology
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: Wolfgang Wieser, Innsbruck, Austria):
Ruben Sommaruga, a native of Uruguay, received his Ph.D. at the University of Innsbruck, Austria, where he is now an Associate Professor. He is known for his outstanding scientific contributions to two fields, microbial ecology of hypertrophic lakes, and UV-photobiology. He has proposed a general theory about the roles of Microcystis aeruginosa and Planktothrix agardhii in shaping the structure of the microbial food web and the ecological importance of filamentous grazing-resistant bacteria in hypertrophic lakes. Among his most influential achievements in the second field are the findings that ultraviolet-A (UVA) radiation is as effective in reducing bacterial activity as UVB, that UV radiation has the potential of affecting carbon flow between protists and bacteria, and that intracellular UV-absorbing compounds, called mycosporine-like amino acids, are present not only in marine organisms but also in inhabitants of alpine lakes. Sommaruga has published extensively on plankton ecology, water chemistry, and UV-physics. He is still conducting and supervising projects in Uruguay, particularly with respect to the effects of UV radiation in coastal lagoons and practical problems of eutrophication.

David M. Post (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Yale University, New Haven, CT, 06520 USA), IRPE Prize Winner 2003 in limnetic ecology
Quotation of the Jury (Chairman: Colin Reynolds, Ambleside,UK):
David Post has quickly established a reputation for interesting and innovative research in the variability inherent in food-web structure, especially that which is attributable to the ontogenies and variable demographies of the main components. Well-versed in trophic cascades, the dynamics of fish populations and their roles in nutrient cycling, David has already registered an outstanding contribution to the development of limnetic ecology. His recognition that food-chain length is related primarily to the size of the supportive ecosystem, rather than to the efficiency of energy transfer, as hitherto supposed, has confirmed him as one of the brightest young limnetic ecologists. Members of the Jury consider him especially worthy of the IRPE Laureate and the encouragement for further studies that it brings.

Markus G. Weinbauer (Laboratoire d'Océanographie de Villefranche-sur-Mer, France), IRPE Prize winner 2004 in marine ecology.
Quotation of the Jury (Chairmann: Victor Smetacek, Bremerhaven, Germany):
Dr. Markus G. Weinbauer has made major contributions towards elucidating the role of viruses in microbial food webs and their effect on prokaryotic diversity. His work has provided new insights into the role of viruses as pathogens of prokaryotes in oxic and anoxic systems, the relationship between viral lysis and dormant viral infection in surface, deep and anoxic waters, the role of repair of ultraviolet radiation-induced DNA damage in the sustenance of high viral activity, and the relative effect of viral lysis and protist grazing of prokaryotes in food web processes in marine and freshwater systems. Markus has worked in Europe and the USA and is actively engaged in training students and young scientists.

This page was last updated on 14 August 2004