Trial by fire

publications in international scientific journals. He graduated cum laude in 1993.
After graduating, Mark took up a post as associate expert in the Proyecto Regional
de Apicultura y Meliponicultura (PRAM) at the Universidad Nacional (UNA) in Costa
Rica. He assisted in the development of research programs on pollination and the foraging behaviour of bees. Responsibilities included the supervision of M.Sc. students
from throughout the region, and the development of a methodology for palynological
analysis of honey and pollen samples. Based on these activities several papers were
published.
In August 1996 he accepted a Ph.D. position at Utrecht University in a cooperation
program with the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) in Indonesia. The
research was done at the Wanariset Samboja research station in East Kalimantan,
which is managed by Tropenbos International and the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry
(MOF). During the first 1.5 years, his research focussed on the effects of forest fragmentation on populations dynamics of shade tolerant trees. The continuation of this research was impeded by extensive fires in March 1998, which burned the largest part of
the forest in the research area. Adjusting his research to the new circumstances, he
studied vegetation dynamics after forest fire in the four years that followed.
Publications
Biesmeijer, J.C., M.G.L. van Nieuwstadt, S. Lukács and M.J. Sommeijer (1998) The role of internal
and external information in foraging decisions of Melipona workers (Hymenoptera: Meliponinae).
Behav. Ecol. Sociobiol. 42: 107-116.
van Nieuwstadt, M.G.L. and J.F. Ramirez (1994) Uso de colmenas para la polinización de cultivos:
plaguicidas y el uso de un contrato. In: van Veen, J.W., H.G. Arce & A. Ortiz (eds.) Apicultura: estrategias para el manejo adecuado de las colmenas, Memorias del tercer congreso nacional de
apicultura, Costa Rica (In Spanish).
van Nieuwstadt, M.G.L. and C.E. Ruano Iraheta (1997) Relation between size and foraging range
in stingless bees (Apidae, Meliponinae). Apidologie 27: 219-228.
van Nieuwstadt, M.G.L., L.A. Sanchez C., J.C. Biesmeijer, H.G. Arce A. & M.J. Sommeijer (1997)
Foraging behaviour of stingless bees: are their diets really so diverse? In: Mardan, M. et al. (eds.)
Tropical bees and the environment. Proceedings of the Conference on tropical bees and the environment, Malaysia 1995. Beenet Asia, Universiti Pertanian Malaysia, Southbound.
van Nieuwstadt, M.G.L., D. Sheil and K. Kartawinata (2001) The ecological consequences of logging in the burned forests of East Kalimantan, Indonesia. Cons. Biol. 15(4): 1183-1186.
Willems, J.H. and M.G.L. van Nieuwstadt (1996) Long-term after effects of fertilization on aboveground phytomass and species diversity in calcareous grassland. Journal of Vegetation Science 7:
177-184.