Current research

I am an applied ecologist with a strong interest in biological control, invasion biology and nature conservation. The central question of my research is when are populations regulated and what are the conditions under which populations escape such regulation. These questions are not only relevant for advancing our understanding of many ecological processes, but also have a huge application potential.

We use a wide array of systems and methods to answer these questions. The majority of our work is done on herbivorous insects and the organisms they interact with (plants, predators, parasitoids), but we also work on invasive mammals and even on plant pathogenic fungi. More details on specific projects can be found on our research webpage

Curriculum vitae

2007-present	Group leader, University of Fribourg (CH)
2003-2007	Group leader, University of Bern (CH)
2003	Habilitation, University of Bern (CH)
1996	PhD, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich
1993	MSc, University of Kiel (D)
1991-1993	Project entomologist, CABI Delémont (CH)

Representative recent publications (full list with pdfs)

Bacher S (2012) Still not enough taxonomists. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, in press. doi: 10.1016/j.tree.2011.11.003

Brechbühl R, Casas J, Bacher S (2011) Diet choice of a predator in the wild: overabundance of prey and missed opportunities along the prey capture sequence. Ecosphere, 2(12):133. doi:10.1890/ES11-00323.1

Blackburn TM, Pyšek P, Bacher S, Carlton JT, Duncan RP, Jarošík V, Wilson JRU and Richardson DM (2011) A proposed unified framework for biological invasions. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 26: 333–339. doi: 10.1016/j.tree.2011.03.023.

Pyšek P, Jarošík V, Hulme PH, Kühn I, Wild J, Arianoutsou M, Bacher S, Chiron F, Didžiulis V, Essl F, Genovesi P, Gherardi F, Hejda M, Kark S, Lambdon PW, Desprez-Loustau ML, Nentwig W, Pergl J, Poboljšaj K, Rabitsch W, Roques A, Roy DB, Shirley S, Solarz W, Vilà M, Winter M (2010) Disentangling the role of environmental and human pressures on biological invasions. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 107, 12157–12162.

Brechbühl R, Casas J, Bacher S (2010) Ineffective crypsis in a crab spider: a prey community perspective. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B – Biological Sciences 277, 739-746.

Bruggisser O, Schmidt-Entling MH, Bacher S (2010) Effects of vineyard management on biodiversity at three trophic levels. Biological Conservation 143, 1521-1528

Nentwig W, Kühnel E, Bacher S (2010) A Generic Impact-Scoring System Applied to Alien Mammals in Europe. Conservation Biology 24, 302-311.

Walther GR, Roques A, Hulme PE, Sykes MT, Pysek P, Kuhn I, Zobel M, Bacher S, Bugmann H, Czucz B, Dauber J, Hickler T, Jarosik V, Kenis M, Klotz S, Minchin D, Moora M, Nentwig W, Ott J, Panov VE, Reineking B, Robinet C, Semenchenko V, Solarz W, Thuiller W, Vila M, Vohland K, Settele J (2009) Alien species in a warmer world: risks and opportunities. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 24, 686-693.

Sol D, Bacher S, Reader SM & Lefebvre L (2008) Brain size predicts the success of mammal species introduced into novel environments. American Naturalist S172, S63-S71.

Hulme PE, Bacher S, Kenis M, Klotz, S, Kühn I, Minchin D, Nentwig W, Olenin S, Panov V, Pergl J, Pyšek P, Roques A, Sol D, Solarz W, Vilà, M (2008) Grasping at the routes of biological invasions: a framework for integrating pathways into policy. Journal of Applied Ecology 45, 403–414.

Nentwig W., Bacher S., Brandl R. (2011) Ökologie kompakt, 3. Auflage. Elsevier.

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