A5048639514- Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies
- Species Distribution and Climate Change
- Plant and animal studies
- Wildlife Ecology and Conservation
- Ecosystem dynamics and resilience
- Rangeland and Wildlife Management
- Research Data Management Practices
- Animal Ecology and Behavior Studies
- Sustainability and Ecological Systems Analysis
- Data Analysis with R
- Scientific Computing and Data Management
- Plant Water Relations and Carbon Dynamics
- Fire effects on ecosystems
- Isotope Analysis in Ecology
- Advanced Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics
- Invertebrate Taxonomy and Ecology
- Land Use and Ecosystem Services
- Marine and fisheries research
- Plant responses to elevated CO2
- Forest Ecology and Biodiversity Studies
- Environmental DNA in Biodiversity Studies
- Aquatic Invertebrate Ecology and Behavior
- Coral and Marine Ecosystems Studies
- Evolution and Genetic Dynamics
- Forest ecology and management
College of Charleston
2016-2025
Oklahoma State University
2008-2015
Utah State University
2013-2015
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
2010-2011
Oklahoma State University Oklahoma City
2006-2010
Roughly 3% of the Earth's land surface burns annually, representing a critical exchange energy and matter between atmosphere via combustion. Fires range from slow smouldering peat fires, to low-intensity intense crown depending on vegetation structure, fuel moisture, prevailing climate, weather conditions. While links biogeochemistry, climate fire are widely studied within Earth system science, these relationships also mediated by fuels—namely plants their litter—that product evolutionary...
Summary Parenchyma is an important tissue in secondary xylem of seed plants, with functions ranging from storage to defence and effects on the physical mechanical properties wood. Currently, we lack a large‐scale quantitative analysis ray parenchyma ( RP ) axial AP fractions. Here, use data literature fractions investigate potential relationships climate growth form total RAP ). We found 29‐fold variation fraction, which was more strongly related temperature than precipitation. Stem...
It is commonly thought that the biodiversity crisis includes widespread declines in spatial variation of species composition, called biotic homogenization. Using a typology relating homogenization and differentiation to local regional diversity changes, we synthesize patterns across 461 metacommunities surveyed for 10 91 years, 64 checklists (13 500+ years). Across all datasets, found no change was most common outcome, but with many instances differentiation. A weak homogenizing trend 0.3%...
Various ecological mechanisms influence the forms of species richness relationships (SRRs). These can be gathered under five general categories: more individuals, environmental heterogeneity, dispersal limitations, biotic interactions, and multiple pools. Often only first two categories are discussed. In contrast, we examine all explore how they form SRRs. We discuss various sampling schemes methods SRR construction used to gain insight about processes patterns. The field is ripe for probing...
Summary Plant traits vary widely across species and underpin differences in ecological strategy. Despite centuries of interest, the contributions different evolutionary lineages to modern‐day functional diversity remain poorly quantified. Expanding data bases plant plus rapidly improving phylogenies enable for first time a data‐driven global picture major clades higher plants. We mapped five key relevant metabolism, resource competition reproductive strategy onto phylogeny 48324 vascular...
Computer science offers a large set of tools for prototyping, writing, running, testing, validating, sharing and reproducing results; however, computational lags behind. In the best case, authors may provide their source code as compressed archive they feel confident research is reproducible. But this not exactly true. James Buckheit David Donoho proposed more than two decades ago that an article about results advertising, scholarship. The actual scholarship full software environment, code,...
Abstract Little consensus has emerged regarding how proximate and ultimate drivers such as productivity, disturbance temperature may affect species richness other aspects of biodiversity. Part the confusion is that most studies examine at a single spatial scale ignore underlying components can vary with scale. We provide an approach for measurement biodiversity decomposes changes in rarefaction curves into attributed to: (a) abundance distribution, (b) density individuals (c) arrangement...
Mutualistic symbioses with mycorrhizal fungi are widespread in plants. The majority of plant species associate arbuscular (AM) fungi. By contrast, the minority ectomycorrhizal (EM) fungi, have abandoned symbiosis and nonmycorrhizal (NM), or engage an intermediate, weakly AM (AMNM). To understand processes that maintain cause its loss, we reconstructed evolution using a ∼3,000-species seed phylogeny integrated state information. Reconstruction indicated common ancestor plants most likely...
Parenchyma represents a critically important living tissue in the sapwood of secondary xylem woody angiosperms. Considering various interactions between parenchyma and water transporting vessels, we hypothesize structure-function relationship both cell types. Through generalized additive mixed model approach based on 2,332 angiosperm species derived from literature, explored proportion spatial distribution ray axial vessel size, while controlling for maximum plant height range climatic...
Abstract Ecological forecasting provides a powerful set of methods for predicting short‐ and long‐term change in living systems. Forecasts are now widely produced, enabling proactive management many applied ecological problems. However, despite numerous calls an increased emphasis on prediction ecology, the potential to accelerate theory development remains underrealized. Here, we provide conceptual framework describing how forecasts can energize advance theory. We emphasize opportunities...
Biodiversity metrics often integrate data on the presence and abundance of multiple species. Yet our understanding covariation between changes to numbers individuals, evenness species relative abundances, total number remains limited. Using individual-based rarefaction curves, we show how expected positive relationships among in abundance, richness arise, they can break down. We then examined interdependencies more than 1100 assemblages sampled either through time or across space. As...
While human activities are known to elicit rapid turnover in species composition through time, the properties of that increase or decrease their spatial occupancy underlying this less clear. Here, we used an extensive dataset 238 metacommunity time series multiple taxa spread across globe evaluate whether more widespread (large-ranged species) differed how they changed site over 10-90 years metacommunities were monitored relative narrowly distributed (small-ranged species). We found on...
Sharing data is increasingly considered to be an important part of the scientific process. Making your publicly available allows original results reproduced and new analyses conducted. While sharing first step in allowing reuse, it also that easy understand use. We describe nine simple ways make reuse you share easier work with yourself. Our recommendations focus on making understandable, analyze, readily wider community scientists.
Summary Nonlinear relationships between species and their environments are believed common in ecology evolution, including during angiosperms’ rise to dominance. Early angiosperms thought of as woody evergreens restricted warm, wet habitats. They have since expanded into numerous cold dry places. This expansion may included transitions across important environmental thresholds. To understand linear nonlinear angiosperm structure biogeographic distributions, we integrated large datasets...
Sharing data is increasingly considered to be an important part of the scientific process. Making your publicly available allows original results reproduced and new analyses conducted. While sharing first step in allowing reuse, it also that easy understand use. We describe nine simple ways make reuse you share easier work with yourself. Our recommendations focus on making understandable, analyze, readily wider community scientists.
The maximum entropy theory of ecology (METE) is a unified biodiversity that predicts large number macroecological patterns using information on only species richness, total abundance, and metabolic rate the community. We evaluated four major predictions METE simultaneously at an unprecedented scale data from 60 globally distributed forest communities including more than 300,000 individuals nearly 2,000 species. successfully captured 96% 89% variation in rank distribution abundance individual...
Abstract Protected areas are central to biodiversity conservation. For marine fish, protected (MPAs) often harbour more individuals, especially of species targeted by fisheries. But precise pathways change remain unclear. example, how local‐scale responses combine affect regional biodiversity, important for managing spatial networks MPAs, is not well known. Protection potentially influences three components fish assemblages that determine accumulate with sampling effort and scale: the total...
Abstract Interspecific spatial associations (ISA), which include co‐occurrences, segregations, or attractions among two more species, can provide important insights into the structuring of communities. However, ISA has primarily been examined in context understanding interspecific interactions, while other aspects ISA, including its relations to biodiversity facets and how it changes face anthropogenic pressures, have largely neglected. This is likely because unclear what makes useful a...
Abstract Estimating biodiversity and its change in space time poses serious methodological challenges. First, there has been a long debate on how to quantify biodiversity, second, measurements of are scale‐dependent. Therefore, comparisons metrics between communities ideally carried out across scales. Simulations can be used study the behaviour scales, but most approaches system specific, plagued by large parameter spaces, therefore cumbersome use interpret. However, realistic spatial...
Abstract Understanding how species are non‐randomly distributed in space and the resulting spatial structure responds to ecological, biogeographic, anthropogenic drivers is a critical piece of biodiversity puzzle. However, most metrics that quantify diversity (i.e., community differentiation), such as Whittaker’s β‐diversity, depend on sampling effort influenced by pool size, abundance distributions, numbers individuals. Null models useful for identifying degree differentiation among...