The consequences of climate change will present us with challenges in the future, the extent and significance of which for our lives is currently very difficult for individuals to assess and understand. Whether we are talking about single resources such as water or the entire urban ecosystem, we first need to understand i) how current conditions are and how they are influenced, ii) how they have already changed and iii) how they will continue to change - and what options we have to adapt and minimize the negative effects of change locally.

Urban greenery is already an essential component of healthy cities, providing many ecosystem services such as positive psychological effects, shaded and cooler places in increasingly hot summers, the storage of CO² and providing the basis for urban biodiversity. It is likely that this importance will increase considerably in the future as, e.g., more and more people will live in cities that will benefit from urban greenery and its local buffering function for the effects of climate change.

My research interests are therefore very interdisciplinary to cover as many relevant aspects as possible - mostly related to the urban ecosystem. For example:

• Climate adaptation: adaptation strategies, measures and their implementation in planning processes
• Urban climatology and biometeorology: Measurement and evaluation of urban heat effects and possible adaptation measures, microclimate
• Urban ecosystem services: Inventories, ways of consideration in planning or political decisions, living quality of public spaces

Urban ecology and urban greenery

NaMaRes - Resource management in city districts in the context of sustainable urban development, KIT-AGW

• Joint project, with partners from KIT, City of Karlsruhe and external bureaus (GIS/software development; planning), funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and research
• Aim: development of a webtool for the physical description and evaluation of the city district regarding the existing resources (in the field of water, area and material flows, open and green spaces, existing ecosystem services), which also includes actors, their options for action, conflicts of objectives. Resource-efficient solutions will be simulated and tested.
   

KomKlim: Implementation of municipal climate adaptation in urban land use planning in the pilot project for the development of the Spinelli Barracks site / northeast green corridor in Mannheim (01/2017 – 08/2018), KIT-IfR

• Cooperation project between the KIT - Institutes for Regional Science and Applied Geosciences and the Administration of the City of Mannheim, funded by the State Institute for Environment Baden-Württemberg (LUBW)
• Scientists were integrated in the Planning Office of the City of Mannheim as Climate experts within an ongoing urban planning process
• Development of a climate adaptation concept for the new city district (heat/heavy rainfall/ventilation), considering the legal regulations.
• Study of opportunities and barriers for the implementation of adaptation measures
• Report (in German)
   

Technical, economic, social and political consequences of dismantling a nuclear power plant at regional and local level (2016), KIT-IfGG
 

Study of the ecology of ticks as vectors of pathogens in Baden - Württemberg with regard to habitat, land use, host animals and climate (2012 – 2016), KIT-IfGG

• Joint project between the KIT Institute for Geography and Geoecology, the Zoological Institute, and the State Health Authority of Baden-Württemberg, partly financed by the BWPLUS program of the Ministry of the Environment, Climate, and Energy of Baden-Württemberg.
• Full scholarship of the Graduate School for Climate and Environment (GRACE) of the KIT
• Doctoral thesis (in English)
   

• July 2016 Doctoral thesis: "Habitat ecology and microclimatic influences on the distribution of Ixodes ricinus ticks in Baden-Württemberg", published in the KIT Library
• 2014 - 2015 Full scholarship of the Graduate School for Climate and Environment (GRACE)
• 2012 - 2013 Mentoring Program of KIT (X-Ment External Link)
• 2012 - 2016 Further education in project management and scientific writing, financed by Karlsruhe House of Young Scientists (KHYS)
• 2012 - 2016 Training Program of the Helmholtz Graduate School for Climate and Environment (GRACE)
• 2003 - 2011 Study of Geoecology at KIT (until 2009: University of Karlsruhe)

Urban Ecology - lecture, internship and seminar

Exchange KATHES cooperation - Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and Aristoteles University of Thessaloniki (AUTh), funded by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD)

Supervised theses (from 2019)

Bender, Thomas (2020):

Jerutka, Kirke (2020): Structural and functional diversity of city squares - an assessment concept. Bachelor thesis.

Mandler, Rebekka (2020): Development of an urban climatological model for the analyses of cold air flows and the urban heat island using the Innenstadt-Ost in Karlsruhe as an example. Master Thesis (in German).

Geiger, Yannis (2019): Modeling of urban climate effects of building measures on the southern campus of the KIT on adjacent urban areas. Master's Thesis (in German).

Bach, Jessica (2019): The heat stress and effects of the environmental parameters of the Lidellplatz in downtown Karlsruhe on the human bioclimate. Master thesis (in German).

Krehl, Alice (2019): Inventory of ecosystem services in the eastern city centre of Karlsruhe. Bachelor thesis (in German).

Böhnke, D; Jerutka, K. (2020): City squares: On the evaluation of the amenity quality of urban spaces (in German).
STADT und RAUM 6/2020, S 330-335

2017

Boehnke, Denise; Gebhardt, Reiner; Petney, Trevor; Norra, Stefan (2017) On the complexity of measuring forests microclimate and interpreting its relevance in habitat ecology: the example of Ixodes ricinus ticks In: Parasites and Vectors, in press. DOI 10.1186/s13071-017-2498-5 Open access

2016

Böhnke, Denise (2016) Habitat ecology and microclimatic influences on the distribution of Ixodes ricinus ticks in Baden-Württemberg Dissertation, Karlsruhe DOI(KIT): 10.5445/IR/1000061789 Open access

Brugger K; Boehnke D; Petney T; et.al. (2016) A Density Map of the Tick-Borne Encephalitis and Lyme Borreliosis Vector Ixodes ricinus (Acari: Ixodidae) for Germany In: Journal of Medical Entomology, vol.53, n°6, 2016, p. 1292-1302. DOI: 10.1093/jme/tjw116 Access

2015

Boehnke D; Brugger K; Pfäffle M; Sebastian P; Norra S; Petney T; Oehme R; Littwin N; Lebl K; Raith J; Walter M; Gebhardt R; Rubel F (2015) Estimating Ixodes ricinus densities on the landscape scale International Journal of Health Geographics. DOI: 10.1186/s12942-015-0015-7 Open access

Petney T; Pfäffle M.; Littwin N.; Norra S.; Böhnke D.; Hogewind F.; Gebhardt R.; Oehme R; Steidle J.; Kahl O.; Dautel H. (2015) Untersuchung der Ökologie von Zecken als Überträger von Krankheitserregern in Baden - Württemberg in Bezug auf Habitat, Landnutzung, Wirtstiere und Klima In: Fachdokumente zur Umweltforschung der LUBW. Gefördert durch Programm „Lebensgrundlage Umwelt und ihre Sicherung“ (LUBW), Land Baden-Württemberg. Zwischenbericht 2015

Presentations and posters