We’re very happy to serve as one of the new academic homes of Dr. Matthew Austin! Matthew is a postdoc with the Living Earth Collaborative studying how climate-induced flowering phenology shifts impact interspecific pollen transfer and the evolution of mating systems. Matthew is broadly interested in how pollination systems respond to environmental variability and graduated …
Continue reading Welcome to Matthew Austin!
Integrating different types of data to infer species’ biogeographic histories
Watch our talk given at the Annual Meeting of the Ecological Society of America on a novel technique for integrating pollen, DNA, and occurrence data to infer biogeographical trajectories! Based on our review which won “runner-up” in Ecography‘s E4 Award: Hoban, S., Dawson, A. Robinson, J., Smith, A.B., Strand, A. 2019. Inference of biogeographic history …
Continue reading Integrating different types of data to infer species’ biogeographic histories
Welcome to Kelsey Bartlett!
We’re very happy to have with us Kelsey Bartlett, who is an undergraduate at George Washington University! Kelsey is georeferencing herbarium records of Ascelpias (milkweeds) of North America. Most these records are not georeferenced, or if they are, lack an estimate of uncertainty in the coordinates. As a result, about 90% of these records would …
Continue reading Welcome to Kelsey Bartlett!
Modeling GORP (genetics-occurrence-rhizosphere-phenotype)
We are very happy to partner with collaborators at Kansas State University and the University of Kansas to study the interdependence between the occurrence, phenotype, genotype, and rhizosphere (soil microbes) of a dominant tallgrass prairie plant, Big Bluestem (Andropogon gerardii)! On this end, we’ll be constructing highly-hierarchical Bayesian models to test functional hypotheses about each …
Continue reading Modeling GORP (genetics-occurrence-rhizosphere-phenotype)
Shortlisted on The Wildlife Society’s 2020 Wildlife Publication Awards!
Our paper on spatially-varying controls of pika distributions was shortlisted (of 5 papers) by The Wildlife Society! This is a triennial award with a record number of submissions, so we’re honored, regardless of the final outcome. Smith, A.B., Beever, E.A., Kessler, A.E., Johnston, A.N., Ray, C., Epps, C.W., Lanier, H.C., Klinger, R.C., Rodhouse, T.J., Varner, …
Continue reading Shortlisted on The Wildlife Society’s 2020 Wildlife Publication Awards!
Thank you for attending our webinar on using museum & herbarium specimen data!
Thanks again to the over webinar 400 attendees! A recording plus answers to questions asked by attendees and resources mentioned in the webinar can be found here.
Adam promoted to Associate Scientist!
The decimation of Madagascar’s rainforest habitat
It is honestly with sadness that I announce our new publication on the fate of Madagscar’s rainforest habitat in Nature Climate Change. Modeling deforestation assuming the lowest rate of deforestation across the period 2000-2014, I could only get the rainforest to last to the 2070s… and the highest rate of loss occurred in 2018, outside …
Continue reading The decimation of Madagascar’s rainforest habitat
Runner-up in Ecography’s E4 Award!
Our article on formal integration of different lines of biogeographic evidence (genetic, pollen, occurrence) won runner-up in annual Ecography’s E4 Award! Hoban, S., Dawson, A. Robinson, J., Smith, A.B., Strand, A. 2019. Inference of biogeographic history by formally integrating distinct lines of evidence: genetic, environmental niche, and fossil. Ecography 42:1991-2011. (open access)