Csaba Vad
I am an aquatic ecologist, motivated to understand how populations and communities respond to natural environmental gradients and anthropogenic stressors. My key interests include biodiversity changes in the Anthropocene with relevance to ecosystem functioning, trophic relationships within plankton communities, and eco-evolutionary dynamics. I am combining field studies and experimental approaches to test ecological theories with plankton communities as models.
I received my PhD in 2014 at Eötvös Loránd University. During my PhD research (supervisor: Éva Ács), I studied temporal dynamics of zooplankton in small ponds, and gained expertise in freshwater ecology, zooplankton taxonomy and ecology.
Later on, I pursued postdoctoral research at WasserCluster Lunz, Austria in the lab of Robert Ptacnik. First, I joined the lab via an Ernst Mach Worldwide Grant and later as a Marie Skłodowska-Curie postdoctoral fellow. Here, I made my first steps towards experimental ecology by gaining my first experience in handling zoo- and phytoplankton cultures and performing laboratory and mesocosm experiments.
Afterwards, I worked at KU Leuven, Belgium, as a postdoc and later as a visiting researcher in the research group of Luc De Meester. Here, I was co-PI of a project aiming to reveal the relevance of eco-evolutionary dynamics in saline ponds of the Carpathian Basin. My stay here enriched my knowledge in evolutionary biology and eco-evolutionary dynamics, including the practical implementation of life table experiments and eco-evolutionary field transplant experiments.
After returing to Hungary in 2019, I first worked as a postdoctoral researcher in the research group of Ferenc Jordán at the Balaton Limnological Institute of Centre for Ecological Research. I started my own research group in April 2021 at Institute of Aquatic Ecology of HUN-REN Centre for Ecological Research.
Vad Lab 