This post is jointly written by a postdoc in ecology/evolution, and a PhD student in education sciences. Our backgrounds may be very different, but we share the interest in changing the learning culture at university, which currently leaves some of the brightest minds behind. To explain what we mean by that, we would like to take you on a personal journey about our own struggles and how they shaped our views on the higher education system.
“Perhaps because I visited these forests and was struck by their uniqueness (such as the remnant Nothofagus forest) and vibrant life, I felt the recent massive destruction as a mental and even physical stress.”
Life in nature is full of systems that we can learn from. Systems like the poison-frogs and their signals. We can observe life responding to the laws of nature to learn how systems work. The principles that we learn can guide our understanding of other systems.
In biology, data on species abundance, diversity and traits are made openly available in big biodiversity databases: big data. Here, I highlight some problems that big data approaches can have, which is particularly worrying if analysis outcomes are used to inform (inter)national policies on conservation strategies.*
Tyrian purple is a unique dye, which comes from the snail Hexaplex trunculus. Thousands of years ago, so many snails were harvested that the shells left behind forever changed the landscape of many Mediterranean cities. These middens, mounds of shell remains reflect the demand of ancient royalty for something as simple as the color purple. By pairing archeological studies of middens with modern experiments, the feeding patterns of H. trunculus can be revealed.
The next iteration in a series of posts entitled “Reflections on the Past”, by Hari Sridhar. Read how Hari revisits old papers in ecology and evolution through interviews with their authors. To view the full series visit: http://www.reflectionsonpaperspast.wordpress.com
Myriad species exist where males within the same population display alternative morphologies, often referred to as minors and majors (“lovers and fighters”), that are associated with different ways of gaining access to mates. Their coexistence is typically explained using sexual selection theory. However, other explanations exist, but they have not been explored in great depth yet.*
This is a series of posts entitled “Reflections on the Past”, by Hari Sridhar. To view the full series visit: http://www.reflectionsonpaperspast.wordpress.com
This is a series of posts entitled “Reflections on the Past”, by Hari Sridhar. To view the full series visit: http://www.reflectionsonpaperspast.wordpress.com
Preservation of natural spaces, species, and resources were viewed as being intimately linked to preservation of the white race and its power. The rhetoric boiled down to essentially this: preservation of nature means preservation of what belongs to white people, the superior race and the only race qualified to steward these resources.
Can you leave academia, take a long break, and come back? I talk about my experience of being a returner to science and how I am taking up mentoring to share my experience with others.
When plants made their foray onto land 460 million years ago, they weren’t alone; along with them evolved a new type of fungi, without which the first plants would likely not have survived. Fast forward to the present, and those same fungi now inhabit the roots of 80-90% of modern vascular land plants, offering nutrients in exchange for carbohydrates, with groups ranging from coveted truffles to species with newly discovered symbioses in the Mucoromycotina, previously thought to be only parasitic or saprophytic.
Eco-evolutionary dynamics are well studied but the term is applied to a wide variety of effects and interactions. Yet comparing these different types of studies on eco-evolutionary dynamics will inform on how this field can move forward, which is precisely the aim of a recent British Ecological Society cross-journal Special Feature. Here I discuss a study published within this Special Feature that investigates how an eco-evolutionary feedback loop between population dynamics and fighter expression affects the evolution of alternative reproductive tactics.
The current generation of graduate students are poised to become the leaders of their respective fields by the middle of the century. It is their ideas that will be of greatest influence in advancing the field of ecology in the decades to. So, what are their ideas? How do they think long-term research will provide new insights in 10, 20, 30 years? Maybe in 30 years we’ll find out our projections were wrong, but reflection won’t be possible if we don’t first scan the horizon.
Our experiences of the natural world are increasingly mediated, which is why I use citizen science to bring ecology students outside and learn naturalist skills
: All quantitative research methods are based on models. All statistical tests, all summary statistics, all raw data, and even our ideas are models. Failing to appreciate the ubiquity of models leads to misunderstanding the epistemology of science itself. Conversely, realizing that all science is an act in model building leads to more creative and robust inquiries, and, ultimately, better inference.
Latest “Reflections of the Past” post. This is a series by Hari Sridhar who interviews authors of well-known papers in ecology. Posts in this series are archived at reflectionsonpaperspast.wordpress.com.
Over the last century, a predominant number of biological investigations utilized either model systems or laboratory populations for experimentation. While model organisms are extensively studied from diverse perspectives (genetics, behaviour, life-history, etc.) it would be imprudent to assume new organism-oriented discoveries are behind us. Most recently, Stewart et al. (2018) revealed the existence of a new male type in the laboratory model organism, the bulb mite Rhizoglyphus robini.
This is a series of posts entitled “Reflections on the Past”, a series by Hari Sridhar. Hari interviews authors of well-known papers in ecology for first-hand accounts of the ins-and-outs of high-impact research. Posts in this series are archived at reflectionsonpaperspast.wordpress.com.
We are in great need of an integrative framework that allows ecologists to predict life history strategies from functional traits that inform on population performance. The aim of a recent British Ecological Society cross-journal Special Feature is to link organismal functions, life history strategies and population performance. Here I discuss a test published within this Special Feature that shows how a recently developed dynamic energy budget population model can be used to infer from life history traits the population performance of bulb mites (Rhizoglyphus robini) in the lab.
The bright spots approach aims to assess the performance of managed ecosystems by comparing certain ecological outcomes, while controlling for other known drivers of the outcome via a statistical model; in effect, ranking sites based on their residuals from the fitted model. While the method has the potential to reduce bias in comparing different sites, the resulting assessment may come with high variance.
Migration bottlenecks provide researchers with fascinating opportunities to study animal movement ecology. Advances in technology enable the dissemination of migratory ground-speed data in relation to independent variables such as weather conditions and time of day. I spent a week in the region of Calabria, Italy monitoring raptor migrations over the Strait of Messina bottleneck. In a single field day over 1,382 migratory raptors were counted; approximately 80% of these were European Honey Buzzards (Pernis apivorus). This post identifies Europe’s most important migratory raptor bottlenecks and highlights the threats facing migratory avifauna.
No spoilers here. The villain in The Avengers: Infinity War understands ecology pretty well and we should consider his motivation as an ecologist. We need to talk a lot more about how to slow population growth.
Simple “comparison of means” experiments … train our brains to think that this is the goal of science – to discover if an effect exists.
We seek out ecologists with diverse backgrounds and perspectives to highlight their work and share their stories and experiences. Check out this week’s Ecologist Spotlight: Alyssa Frederick!
Rapid Ecology 