Evolutionary Ecology rEEding Group


This group reads and discusses papers in ecology and evolutionary biology. Anyone is welcome to come! For the Spring 2025 semester, we will meet Tuesdays at 14:00 in B8271 (*new room!). . Presenter schedule and pdfs posted below. Sign up sheet is posted here. 


Upcoming 

2025-05-06:
Principles in Population Genetics, Chapter 6.3 - 6.5


Past papers 

2025-04-29:
Principles in Population Genetics, Chapter 6.1 - 6.2 (Chapter 6 linked here)

2025-04-22:
Principles in Population Genetics, Chapter 4.4 - 4.6 (Chapter 5 linked here)

2025-04-15:
Evolutionary history of host trees amplifies the dilution effect of biodiversity on forest pests
code | data

2025-04-08:
Principles in Population Genetics, Chapter 4.0 - 4.3 (Chapter 4 linked here)

2025-04-01:
Code from Dee et al. (2023)

2025-03-25:
Principles in Population Genetics, Chapter 3.6 - 3.7 (Chapter 3 linked here)

2025-03-18:
Clarifying the effect of biodiversity on productivity in natural ecosystems with longitudinal data and methods for causal inference

2025-03-11:
Principles in Population Genetics, Chapter 3.4 - 3.7

2025-03-04:
Direct and indirect selection and the evolution of mating preferences

2025-02-11:
Principles in Population Genetics, Chapter 2.1 - 2.4 (Chapter 2 linked here)

2025-02-04:
Cooperation maximizes biodiversity

2025-01-28:
Principles in Population Genetics, Chapter 1

2025-01-21:
Defining fitness in evolutionary ecology

2024-11-27:
COVID-19 pandemic interventions reshaped the global dispersal of seasonal influenza viruses

2024-12-04:
The Strength of Phenotypic Selection in Natural Populations

2024-11-20:
Phenotypic selection in natural populations: what have we learned in 40 years?

2024-11-13:
Cycles of fusion and fission enabled rapid parallel adaption radiations in Africa cichlids

2024-11-06: Leithen M'Gonigle
The global loss of avian functional and phylogenetic diversity from anthropogenic extinctions

2024-10-30: Alex Beams
Navigating "tip fog": embracing uncertainty in tip measurements

2024-10-23: Michael Foisy
When can higher-order interactions produce stable coexistence?

2024-10-16: Hanna Jackson
The evolutionary history of bees in space and time

2024-10-02: Hanna Jackson
Revealing uncertainty in the status of biodiversity change 

2024-09-18: Ailene MacPherson
Interpretation issues with “genomic vulnerability” arise from conceptual issues in local adaptation and maladaptation 

2024-5-09: Ailene MacPherson
The genomic signatures of evolutionary stasis 

2024-4-25: Everybody
Papers you found interesting this semester! 

2024-4-11: Elijah Reyes
Conceptual and empirical bridges between micro- and macroevolution 

2024-4-4: Hanna Jackson
Species-specific ecological traits, phylogeny, and geography underpin vulnerability to population declines for North American birds 

2024-3-27: Yexuan Song
Local frequency as a key to interpreting species occurrence data when recording effort is not known 

2024-3-21: All
Extra nestlings that are condemned to die increase reporductive success in hoopoes 

2024-3-14: Hanna Jackson
Anthropogenic climate and land-use change drive short- and long-term biodiversity shifts across taxa 

2024-3-07: Alex Beams
Transmissible cancers and the evolution of sex under the Red Queen hypothesis 

2024-2-29: Discussion with Special Guest: Marc Lipsitch
Prediction of post-PCV13 pneumococcal evolution using invasive disease data enhanced by inverse-invasiveness weighting 

2024-2-15: Arne Mooers
The contribution of historical processes to contemporary extinction risk in placental mammals 

2024-2-1: Alex Beams
Not just a theory — the utility of mathematical models in evolutionary biology 

2024-1-24: All
Elevated genetic risk for multiple sclerosis emerged in steppe pastoralist populations 

2023-11-23: Yexuan Song
Characterization of pansocial systems reveals in-group/out-group distinction and out-group tolerance in bonobos 

2023-11-16: Emma Green
Droplet superpropulsion in an energetically constrained insect 

2023-11-09: Elijah Reyes
Fluctuating selection maintains distinct species phenotypes in an ecological community in the wild 

2023-11-02: Alex Beams
A practical guide to selecting models for exploration, inference, and prediction in ecology 

2023-10-26: Elijah Reyes
Same data, different analysts: variation in effect sizes due to analytical decisions in ecology and evolutionary biology 

2023-10-03: Ailene MacPherson
Branching patterns in phylogenies cannot distinguish diversity-dependent diversification from time-dependent diversifications 

2023-09-28: Elijah Reyes
Sexual selection and the evolution of condition dependence: an experimental test at two resource levels 

2023-09-21: Alex Beams
Dispersal limitation and fire feedbacks maintain mesic savannas in Madagascar 

2023-09-14: Arne Mooers
A stabilizing eco-evolutionary feedback loop 

2023-07-27: Miranda Dennis
Genetic differentiation and evolution of broad-leaved evergreen shrub and tree varieties 

2023-07-20: Daniel Pelletier
Standing genetic variation drove rapid ecotype formation in a mosquito 

2023-07-13: Phil Fernandez-Fournier
The Evolution of fast-growing coral reef fishes 

2023-07-06: Chelsea Little
Within-host adaptation alters priority effects within the tomato phyllosphere microbiome 

2023-06-29:Avneet Chhina
Are range limits niche limits? 

2023-06-22: Arne Mooers
Character displacement of egg colors during tinamou speciation 

2023-06-15: Ailene MacPherson (redux!)
A Test of Haldane’s Rule in Neodiprion Sawflies and Implications for the Evolution of Postzygotic Isolation in Haplodiploids 

2023-06-08: Bernie Crespi
The roots of STEM: what are the evolutionary and neural bases of human mathematics and technology 

2023-06-01: Mike Hart
Ancient gene linkages support ctenophores as sister to other animals 

2023-05-25: Ailene MacPherson and Ananga Bajgai
Phylogenetic correlates of extinction risk in mammals: species in older lineages are not at greater risk 

2023-05-18: Cedric Chauve
Modeling the ecology of parasitic plasmids 

2023-05-11: Emma Green
The expansion of agriculture has shaped the recent evolutionary history of a specialized squash pollinator 

2023-05-04: Elijah Reyes
Female preference for rare males is maintained by indirect selection in Trinidadian guppies 

2023-04-27: Phil Fernandez-Fournier
To harness traits for ecology, let’s abandon ‘functionality’ 

2023-04-20: Hanna Jackson
How much does the typical ecological meta-analysis overestimate the true mean effect size? 

2023-04-13: Prof. John Gittleman (visiting from UGA)
The costs and benefits of primary prevention of zoonotic pandemics 

2022-10-28: Daniel Pelletier and Emma Kominek
Phylogenetic diversity only weakly mitigates climate-change-driven biodiversity loss in insect communities 

2022-10-13: Everyone (lead author D. Michelle Tseng is giving Faculty of Environment talk at 1530 in the Halpern Centre, so this is just a warm-up)
Species interactions mediate thermal evolution 

2022-10-13: Nick Dulvy, Sarah Gravel, Amanda Rowlands
Metabolic scaling is the product of life-history optimization 

2022-03-10: All
Erosion of global functional diversity across the tree of life 

2022-03-03: Avneet Chhina
Demographic decline and lineage-specific adaptations characterize New Zealand kiwi 

2022-02-17: Arne Mooers
Evolutionary legacies in contemporary tetrapod imperilment 

2022-02-10: Jayme Lewthwaite
Widespread homogenization of plant communities in the Anthropocene 

2022-02-03: Leithen M'Gonigle
The ecological stage maintains preference differentiation and promotes speciation 

2021-12-02: Jenny Bigman
The global ocean size spectrum from bacteria to whales 

2021-11-25: Leithen M'Gonigle
Two different epigenetic information channels in wild three-spined sticklebacks are involved in salinity adaptation 

2021-11-18: Emma Green
Rapid climate change results in long-lasting spatial homogenization of phylogenetic diversity 

2021-11-4: Rassim Khelifa
Combining range and phenology shifts offers a winning strategy for boreal Lepidoptera 

2021-10-28: Wade VanderWright
The sardine run in southeastern Africa is a mass migration into an ecological trap 

2021-10-21: Melissa Guzman
Rapid Anthropocene realignment of allometric scaling rules 

2021-10-14: Leithen M'Gonigle
Changes in climate drive recent monarch butterfly dynamics 

2021-04-29: Elijah Reyes
Adaptation across geographic ranges is consistent with strong selection in marginal climates and legacies of range expansion
Manuscript, pdf 

2021-04-22: Matt Pennell
Towards robust statistical inference for complex computer models
Ecology Letters, pdf 

2021-04-15: open discussion
Plasticity versus Evolutionary Divergence: What Causes Habitat Partitioning in Urban Adapted Birds?
American Naturalist, pdf 

2021-04-01: Melissa Guzman
Climate drivers of adult insect activity are conditioned by life history traits
Preprint, pdf 

2021-03-25: Dan Greenberg
Why aren't rabbits and hares larger?
Evolution, open access 

2021-03-18: Jayme Lewthwaite
The evolution of critical thermal limits of life on Earth
Nature Communications, open access 

2021-03-11: Jennifer Bigman
An inconvenient tooth: Evaluating female choice in multiple paternity using an evolutionarily and ecologically important vertebrate clade
Molecular Ecology, pdf 

2021-03-04: Arne Mooers
Biodiversity loss underlies the dilution effect of biodiversity
Ecology Letters, pdf 

2021-02-25: open discussion
Avoiding wasted research resources in conservation science
Conservation Science and Practise, open access 

2021-02-11: Deb Obrist
Beyond a single patch: local and regional processes explain diversity patterns in a seagrass epifaunal metacommunity
(pdf) 

2021-02-04: Sarah Johnson
A complete inventory of North American butterfly occurence data, narrowing gaps but increasing bias
Ecography, open access 

2021-01-28 David Green
Ecological drivers of global gradients in avian dispersal inferred from wing morphology
Nature Communications, open access 

2021-01-21 David Green
How do habitat amount and habitat fragmentation drive time-delayed responses of biodiversity to land-use change?
(pdf) 

2020-12-10 Jayme Lewthwaite
Climate-related phenology changes interact with generations-per-year to influence range shifts in British butterflies
Nature Communications, so open-access 

2020-12-03 Dan Greenberg
Clustered versus catastrophic vertebrate population declines
(pdf ; see also this blog) 

2020-11-18 (Wednesday): Vancouver Evolution Group (VEG)
Evolution of Senescence
(VEG site with information) 

2020-11-12: Em Lim
Understanding false, random and structural zeros in ecology
(pdf) 

2020-11-05: Philippe Fernandez-Fournier
Fahrig (again!)
(pdf1) vs. (pdf2) 

2020-10-29: Melissa Guzman (again!)
Habitat fragmentation: a long and tangled tale
(pdf1) vs. (pdf2) 

2020-10-22: Arne Mooers
The carrying capacity for species richness
(pdf) 

2020-10-15: Miranda Dennis
Deconstructing the Impact of Malaria Vector Diversity on Disease Risk
(pdf) 

2020-10-08: Melissa Guzman
No net insect declines across US long term ecological research sites
(pdf)
See also this blog by Brian McGill

2020-10-01: Elijah Reyes
Price's Equation made clear
(open access url)

2020-09-24: Jen Bigman
Fish reproductive-energy output increases disproportionately with body size
(pdf)

2020-07-30: Hanna Jackson/Hutton Noth
Diving back in time: Extending historical baselines for yelloweye rockfish with Indigenous knowledge
(pdf) 

2020-07-23: Leithen M'Gonigle
Species loss drives ecosystem function in experiments, but in nature the importance of species loss depends on dominance
(pdf) (supplement) 

2020-07-16: Ruth Linksy
No consistent effects of humans on animal genetic diversity worldwide
(pdf) (supplement) (background 1) (background 2) 

2020-07-09: Leithen M'Gonigle
Global synthesis of the effectiveness of flower strips and hedgerows on pest control, pollination services and crop yield
(pdf) (supplement) 

2020-07-02: Melissa Guzman
The Diversity–Innovation Paradox in Science
(pdf) and also this open letter

2020-06-25: Dan Greenberg
Extinction filters mediate the global effects of habitat fragmentation on animals
(pdf) (supplement)

2020-06-11: Leithen M'Gonigle
Model selection for ecological community data using tree shrinkage priors
(pdf) 

2020-06-04: Melissa Guzman
Temperature-related biodiversity change across temperate marine and terrestrial systems
(pdf) 

2020-05-28: Jayme Lewthwaite
Host use diversification during range shifts shapes global variation in Lepidopteran dietary breadth
(pdf) 

2020-05-21: Leithen M'Gonigle
Ecological Limits as the Driver of Bird Species Richness Patterns along the East Himalayan Elevational Gradient
(pdf) 

2020-05-14: Allison Dennert
Species richness change across spatial scales
(pdf)

2020-05-07: Leithen M'Gonigle
Meta-analysis reveals declines in terrestrial but increases in freshwater insect abundances
(pdf) (supplement)

2020-04-30: Dan Greenberg
A simple dynamic model explains the diversity of island birds worldwide
(pdf)

2020-04-23: Melissa Guzman
Neural hierarchical models of ecological populations
(pdf)

2020-04-16: Jenny Bigman
Fish body sizes change with temperature but not all species shrink with warming
(pdf) (supplement)

2020-04-09: Arne Mooers
Site-selection bias and apparent population declines in long-term studies
(pdf)

2020-04-02: Dan Greenberg
Ecologically diverse clades dominate the oceans via extinction resistance
(pdf) (supplement)

2020-03-26: Liam Johnson
The influence of host-plant connectivity on fungal assemblages in the root microbiota of Brachypodium pinnatum
(pdf)

2020-03-19: Laura Kroesen
Temporal road closures improve habitat quality for wildlife
(pdf)

2020-02-27: Ruth Linksy
First integrative trend analysis for a great ape species in Borneo
(pdf) (supplement) 

2020-02-13: Sarah Johnson
Climate change contributes to widespread declines among bumble bees across continents
(pdf) (supplement) 

2019-11-26: Sarah Johnson
A novel application of the Price equation reveals that landscape diversity promotes the response of bees to regionally rare plant species
(pdf) (supplement)

2019-11-12: Jayme Lewthwaite
Strong phenotypic plasticity limits potential for evolutionary responses to climate change
(pdf) (supplement)

2019-10-29: Jenny Bigman
Breakdown of brain–body allometry and the encephalization of birds and mammals
(pdf) (supplement) and also (reply) (reply^2)

2019-10-15: Will Stein
Decline of the North American avifauna
(pdf) and also read this blog post

2019-10-01: Arne Mooers
Not even wrong: the spurious measurement of biodiversity's effects on ecosystem functioning
(pdf) 

2019-09-17: Melissa Guzman
Identifying a common backbone of interactions underlying food webs from different ecosystems
(pdf)