People

You can find us at the Viikki Campus (Biocentre 3), Helsinki, Finland. The backgrounds of our members range from ecology, evolutionary biology, and genomics to landscape genetics and spatial modeling.
Marjo Saastamoinen

Professor in Evolutionary Ecology

Office: 5715 (Biocenter 3)
E-mail:
Phone: + 358 50 448 4471

  • Life history ecology & evolution
  • Dispersal
  • Genotype-phenotype association
  • Phenotypic plasticity
  • Ecological immunology
Mahtab Yazdanian

Post-doctoral researcher

Office: 5604 (Biocenter 3)
E-mail:

In REC, my postdoctoral research focuses on developing and evaluating genetic diversity indices to assess the genetic health of species and communities across Finland's aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. I analyse how human perturbations impact genetic diversity, and assess the suitability of these genetic indicators for biodiversity monitoring programs.

  • Biodiversity and global change
  • Functional and community ecology
  • Trophic interactions
  • Spatio-temporal analysis
  • Long-term ecological datasets
  • Species distribution modelling
Matti Laukkanen

Post-doctoral researcher

Office: 5401 (Biocenter 3)
E-mail:

Flávia Nitta Fernandes

Post-doctoral researcher
E-mail:
Room: 5604 (Viikinkaari 1, Biocenter 3)
Patrick Heidbreder

Doctoral researcher

Office: 5202 (Biocenter 3)

E-mail:

PhD project "Survival Under Warming Climate and Adaptive Potential of Hybridization". Funded by the LUOVA doctoral programme (Jan. 2023 - Dec. 2024). Supervised by Jonna Kulmuni and Marjo Saastamoinen.

  • Hybridization and speciation
  • Evolutionary genomics
  • Adaptive potential
  • Thermal performance
Lola Fernández Multigner

Doctoral researcher

Office: 5604 (Biocenter 3)
E-mail:

PhD project "Genetic diversity in Range-Shifting Butterflies". Funded by the LUOVA doctoral programme (Jan. 2024 - Dec. 2027). Supervised by Marjo Saastamoinen and Audrey Bras.

  • Landscape genetics
  • Spatial ecology
  • Genetic diversity
  • Environmental change & conservation
Juho Kökkö

Doctoral researcher

Office: 5604 (Biocenter 3)
E-mail: 

PhD project: “Urban evolution in butterflies, and the potential of citizen science”. Part of the larger project “PLASTI-CITY: Urban evolution of seasonal plasticity across space and time” funded by the Research Council of Finland (2024–2027). Supervised by Matthew Nielsen, Marjo Saastamoinen, and Pauliina Rautio.

  • Urban evolution
  • Seasonal ecology
  • Science education
  • Pieris napi
Matleena Talo

Doctoral researcher

Office: 5604 (Biocenter 3)
E-mail: 
Alumni

Arthur Rodrigues (Post-doctoral researcher -> 2026)

Ulla Riihimäki (Doctoral researcher ->2026)

Suvi Ikonen (Coordinator -> 2026)

Natalie van Dis (Post-doctoral researcher 2023-2025)

Audrey Bras (Post-doctoral researcher 2022-2025)

Nadja Verspagen (Doctoral researcher 2020-2024)

Mariana Pires Braga (Visiting post-doctoral researcher 2021-2023)

Mirkka Jones (University researcher 2023)

Maria Hällfors (Post-doctoral researcher 2018-2022)

Michelle DiLeo (Post-doctoral researcher 2016-2022)

Andrea Santangeli (Post-doctoral researcher 2021-2022)

Abhilash Nair (Post-doctoral researcher & University researcher 2013-2021)

Torsti Schulz (PhD student 2017-2021)

Aapo Kahilainen (Post-doctoral researcher 2015-2021)

Sridhar Halali (Post-doctoral researcher 2021)

Susu Rytteri (PhD student 2016-2021)

Anniina Mattila (Post-doctoral researcher 2015-2020)

Erik van Bergen (Post-doctoral researcher 2019-2020)

Daniel Blande (Post-doctoral researcher 2018-2020)

Ana Salgado (Phd student 2015-2019)

Elena Rosa (Phd student 2014 - 2018, post-doctoral researcher 2019)

Vicencio Oostra (Post-doctoral researcher 2018-2019)

Dimitri Stucki (Post-doctoral researcher 2018-2019)

Anne Duplouy (Post-doctoral researcher 2017-2018)

Virpi Ahola (Post-doctoral researcher 2016-2018)

Lu­isa Woest­mann (Phd student 2014-2017)

Guillaume Minard (Post-doctoral researcher 2015-2017)