Biodiversity Graduate Student Research Enhancement Grants

Human disturbances such as climate change and habitat alteration are driving species extinct at unprecedented rates. Given these ongoing threats, it is critical that we understand the mechanisms that support resilient ecological communities. Increasingly, ecologists are recognizing the importance of species interactions in shaping patterns of biodiversity and driving stability. My research explores how groups respond to disturbance and the extent to which stability is driven by interactions across the group versus the presence of particular species. I am addressing this question in the mixed-species groups of birds that forage at army ant swarms. Army ants are carnivorous insects that occur in lowland forests across the Neotropics. To catch their insect prey, army ants perform raids across the forest floor. The ants’ activity flushes large numbers of insects, and many species of birds, mammals, reptiles, and even fish have been observed feeding at ant swarms. Over 450 bird species (that’s over 12% of tropical bird species!) forage at ant swarms, leading to complex interactions between both the ants and birds and within the groups of birds themselves. Previous work suggests that some bird species are especially important in the formation of these ant-following groups, as they provide acoustic information that alerts others to the ants’ whereabouts. However, how particular species contribute to the maintenance of these groups, and how they respond to loss of different species, is not well understood.

Lake sediments can be used to track the effects of multiple human-induced stressors because they preserve a rich history of past biological communities and conditions from the time they were deposited. My research focuses on using DNA stored in the sediment to assess how phytoplankton and zooplankton have responded to anthropogenic stressors in mountain lakes in Wyoming, Washington, and California over the past few hundred years. This research will aid efforts to anticipate ecosystem transformations and potential state shifts by testing how these three stressors may interact to shape the biodiversity we see today in mountain lakes.

The goal of the project is to examine how habitat heterogeneity and productivity influence avian diversity, and whether species behavioral and morphological traits are related to their abundance across habitats. With this work, we will have a better understanding of how continued changes in habitat will alter diversity in the most speciose region of the world.

My research will combine a controlled laboratory experiment with genomic analyses to address how climate induced range shifts affect a population’s ability to adapt to novel conditions. By experimentally shifting the range of red flour beetles, Tribolium castaneum, in laboratory microcosms and then exposing those beetles to novel conditions, we can approximate the effects of a species shifting its range due to climate change and subsequently encountering novel stressful conditions. Understanding how species adapt to novel conditions after a range shift will improve our understanding of how biodiversity will be maintained in this era of global change.

Due to an unprecedented local and national rise in recreation rates and the highly accessible and striking nature of the higher elevation sites along Snowy Range Scenic Byway which draw increased recreational traffic within the region, establishing the combined ecological and recreational carrying capacity of the area is necessary to properly inform and facilitate corresponding management adjustments such as increased signage, improved educational outreach, and adjusted tourism advertising agendas to maintain the integrity of the landscape and its biodiversity for future generations. this study will include recreationist experience interviews as well as physical and GIS-based assessments of landscape, vegetation, and wildlife impacts imposed by visitors to campgrounds, parking areas, trailheads, and trails near the Snowy Range Scenic Byway section of Highway 130 in Medicine Bow National Forest.

I am studying two populations of Yellowstone cutthroat trout that face anthropogenic pressures: the Yellowstone Lake population where lake trout (Salvelinus namaycush) were introduced in the 1990s and the Teton River population where a recently constructed dam fragmented the river. The well-monitored lake population represents an opportunity to assess how demographic inferences drawn from genomic data compare with field-collected data, which in turn will guide the use of these genomics-based analyses to understand the demographic consequences caused by the dam on the Teton River population. 

The aim of this project is to examine the extent to which fine-scale, keystone habitat elements (KHEs) disproportionately influence patterns of biodiversity within a sagebrush landscape. To do so, we will document the abundance and diversity of multiple taxa within and away from tall, high cover draws to determine the extent to which these features function as KHEs. Concurrently, we will evaluate the extent to which surrounding human-induced habitat changes associated with natural gas development modulate the influence of KHEs on patterns of biodiversity. Results of this work will improve our understanding of how biodiversity arises and is maintained while elucidating the extent to which human-induced rapid environmental change might influence those patterns.

When species move in response to climate change, they often interact with communities whose populations lag behind their optimum habitat, thus creating new biotic assemblages and interactions between species that would not typically come into contact with one another. As such, it is unknown if the interacting effects of climatic and multispecies communities on species responses will promote or hinder range shifts. My research examines how the interplay of multiple global change drivers (warming, nitrogen addition, increased snow-melt) and novel species interactions alters range expansions of species from the sub-alpine into alpine ecosystems.