by Helen Hill for CBIOMES

A warm welcome to incoming researcher Dr Bror Jönsson, a new Senior Scientist in the PML CBIOMES Group.

Bror’s interests lie in the interactions between physical processes and marine ecosystems. In particular, he is interested in the temporal and spatial scales on which different processes control biological production “in a continuum from land to the open ocean”, among them the temporal and spatial scales of coastal ocean acidification, the interactions between physical dynamics in the upper ocean and biological production, phytoplankton dynamics, and the air-sea exchange of gases. He is also interested in the connectivity between different regions in the ocean and its influence on organism biodiversity and biogeochemical cycles, as well as how to combine observations, remote sensing, and modeling to better understand marine ecosystems.

Bror joins the Plymouth Marine Laboratory CBIOMES team looking at biological production and carbon fluxes from space. In particular he is seeking better statistical methods to assess the dynamics in marine ecosystems and to evaluate marine ecosystem models.

Asked what got him started in his field, Bror says, “I’ve always been interested in the natural world around me and fascinated by animals and plants. That and a knack for using computers…”

Story image:  Before his move to Plymouth, Jönsson was a research assistant professor at the University of New Hampshire. In his spare he enjoys cooking, biking, climbing, hiking, kayaking – Photo courtesy: B. Jönsson

Select Publications

E. Villarino, J.R. Watson, Bror F. Jönsson, J.M. Gasol, G. Salazar, S.G. Acinas, et al. (2018)., Large-scale ocean connectivity and planktonic body size, Nature Communications, 9(1), 142. doi: 10.1038/s41467-017-02535-8

Bror F. Jönsson and J.R. Watson (2016), The timescales of global surface ocean connectivity, Nature Communications, 7, 11239, doi: 10.1038/ncomms11239

Bror F. Jönsson and J.E. Salisbury, J. E. (2016), Episodicity in phytoplankton dynamics in a coastal region, Geophysical Research Letters, 43(11), 5821 – 5828. doi: 10.1002/2016GL068683

Bror F. Jönsson, Scott Doney, John Dunne, Michael Bender (2015), Evaluating Southern Ocean biological production in two ocean biogeochemical models on daily to seasonal timescales using satellite chlorophyll and O2 / Ar observations, Biogeosciences, 12, 681- 695, doi: 10.5194/bg-12-681-2015


Bror’s Links:

Researchgate