We are excited to announce that Tanel has started a postdoctoral fellowship funded by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie program at the University of Helsinki, where he works in the Spatial Foodweb Ecology group led by Professor Tomas Roslin. His postdoctoral fellowship will last from 2025 to 2027.

Tanel’s research in Helsinki focuses on how past land use changes have left their mark on today’s soil biodiversity, assessing for the first time the extinction debt in soil ecosystems. He will use extensive data on Estonian agricultural soils, combining molecular ecology, historical landscape data, and ecological network analysis to understand which species and traits promote persistence or extinction in a changing environment.

In collaboration with Professor Roslin and Professor Jarno Vanhatalo, he is developing new statistical and modelling techniques to describe long-term changes in soil biota and their links to landscape and management practices.

According to Tanel, this is an important challenge and opportunity because it combines data-intensive ecology, theoretical thinking, and practical applicability. New skills in network analysis and ecological modelling will contribute to a deeper understanding of how soil ecosystems function and enable a broader contribution to the preservation of biodiversity in a changing world.