Kupčinskienė, Eugenija

Brief description of professional experience: Over 40 years’ experience in teaching in Plant Biology (Plant Anatomy, Morphology and Systematics, Plant Ecology, Mycology and Algology) Over 50 years’ experience doing research in the scale molecular biology-ecosystem
Member of 95 Doctoral Degree and Habitual Doctoral Defense Committees. Expert of Research Council of Lithuania Long-term experience at both East and West European universities. Participation in International Scientific events
European Commission expert for assessment of research and teaching programs (ERASMUS-MUNDUS, MARIA CIURI, FP6, FP7 and related) since 2005 -

Performing research since 1975, Kupčinskienė E. has gained extensive experience in the leading and implementation of the projects concerning bioindication, assessing the complex impact of anthropogenic factors (industrial and agricultural pollutants, especially nitrogen) on coniferous and herbaceous plants. In the former decade she was coordinator of VMU part of the projects funded by RCL ("Genetic diversity of invasive herbal plant species in Lithuania", No. LEK-04/2010, 2010-2011; "Investigation of invasiveness and genomic changes of invasive herbal plant species", No. LEK-07/2012, 2012-2014; "Anthropogenic impact for the stability of plant component in some Lithuania river ecosystems", No. SIT-2/2015; 2015-2018). Subject of these projects were populations of riparian plants, native in Lithuania, invasive in USA (Phalaris arundinacea, Lythrum salicaria), herbaceous plants, invasive in Lithuania (Impatiens glandulifera, Impatiens parviflora, and Echinocystis lobata). Projects were timely executed (with acknowledgements to RCL in the articles). In the attached list of publications, eight of the ten publications have been funded by these projects and three of the ten, in addition to the previous three publications, deal with invasive plants of the genus Impatiens. Presently she is taking part (as coordinator of Lithuanian contributions) in KU Leuven-funded project MICROMICS (Microclimate- and genomics-informed distribution modeling to improve predictions of species’ range dynamics and extinction risk under environmental change), which aims to evaluate the spatial distribution and environmental drivers of neutral and adaptive genomic diversity in the two understory species Circaea lutetiana and Paris quadrifolia (https://research.kuleuven.be/portal/en/project/3E220538), also she is performing project "Comparison of Invasive and Ornamental accessions of Phalaris arundinacea in some areas of Minnesota and Baltic States (2019-2024) (Lithuanian coordinator: Kupcinskiene E.; Minnesota coordinator Neil O. Anderson). Kupčinskienė E. is currently not involved in any projects funded by RCL. The submitted project will not duplicate the previous ones, but will differ from the previous studies on IG by the use of another molecular markers (chloroplast DNA), the inclusion of the study of physiological, endosymbiotic, phytocenological traits, the complex study of the invasiveness and invasiveness of IG, the extension of Lithuanian studies of the IG of chloroplast DNA to IG of other European countries. Kupčinskienė E. was awarded the Prize of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences for Contributions to Nature Conservation in Memory of Professor T. Ivanauskas. Kupčinskienė E. is an expert of the European Commission for assessment of research and teaching programs (ERASMUS-MUNDUS, MARIA CIURI, FP6, FP7, Diversa, COST), an expert of the Research Council of Lithuania and expert of the former Lithuania Science and Study Foundation. She is also a reviewer of many scientific articles in international journals such as Aquatic Botany, Plants, Agriculture, Forestry, IJMS, Diversity, Seeds, Žemdirbystė=Agriculture, JEELM, BMC Genetics, Open Life Sciences, PMBP, Environmental Modelling and Assessment, Dendrobiology, Weed Studies, Cryobiology. She is an expert for the annual judging of the best doctoral thesis in Lithuania for the Presidential Awards. Kupčinskienė E. has supervised implementation of 4 defended and 1 pre-defended (in 2023) doctoral theses. She regularly participates in international conferences (such as NEOBIOTA, EMAPIS) on invasion topics. In cooperation with foreign countries’ scientists, studying the invasions, plants from 17 European countries have been obtained by her and a DNA bank has been created which, judging by the size of other articles, is unrivalled in Europe. Most of Kupčinskienė E. research has been carried out in collaboration with foreign researchers from Western and Central Europe and the USA (as evidenced by the co-authors of the articles).