New Board Member with research focus on aquatic evolutionary biology

11 December 2009

At the request of Prof. Dr. Janet Hering, the Director of the Water Research Institute Eawag and Member of the ETH Board, the ETH Board has appointed Prof. Dr. Jukka Jokela as a Member of the Board as of January 1, 2010.

Jukka Jokela (*1963), a Finnish national, has been Head of the Department of Water Ecology at the Eawag since 2005 and is Full Professor of Aquatic Ecology at ETH Zurich. He is an internationally renowned expert on the evolution of aquatic organisms and questions of the co-evolution of parasites and their carrier species. With Jukka Jokela’s appointment as a Member of the Board, the ETH Board confirms that the interdisciplinary research field of ecology and evolution is being strengthened as a water research focus at the Eawag. The preservation of the biodiversity in bodies of water and the environmentally friendly handling of non-native animal and plant species highlight how the topic-oriented research as stipulated by the Federal Council in its performance mandate is implemented in the service of society. Jukka Jokela achieved wide public recognition in the summer of 2009 with a publication that used the example of New Zealand’s snow coverage to show that sexual reproduction in an environment with many parasites has key long-term advantages for the snail population. Jukka Jokela completes the Eawag Board.

Further information

• Prof. Dr. Jukka Jokela
  
• Eawag press release from July 31, 2009: “Sex to keep parasites at bay”. 
• ETH Board press release from Dec 11 2009