Current lab members
Graduate Students
I am an ecologist interested in the application of fundamental ecology to conservation issues. I explore this through two main research avenues. First, I use ecological theory in combination with lab and field experiments to understand how temperature affects nutrient availability, and downstream consequences for aquatic community structure and function. Specifically, I consider biological nitrogen fixation as a mechanism for temperature sensitive nitrogen supply to photosynthesis. Second, I use field surveys and experiments to study drivers of eelgrass ecosystem degradation over the past four decades in James Bay, Quebec. I work on a collaborative team with scientists from all over Canada and local Cree experts to understand the current abundance and distribution as well as the capacity for eelgrass recovery in the Bay.
Outside of my research, I also run the Conservation Discussion Group and am active in UBC’s sustainability community. Check out Kaleigh's personal website here. |
I am interested in the investigation of large-scale ecological questions, with a focus on threatened ecosystems and how they will be impacted by climate change. I am particularly interested in how climate change will alter the physical structure of ecosystems, and in turn what impact this will have on community composition and ecosystem function.
My past research has focused on Species at Risk conservation, identifying and developing applied solutions to conservation issues within Canada, and understanding how past experiences influence mate choice and maternal investment. |
PhD Student: Andrew Simon (he/him)My research draws on historical collections, field studies, and crowd-sourced biodiversity data, combined with environmental monitoring and remote sensing techniques, to analyse drivers of biodiversity change at multiple scales. I study a wide variety of organisms, linking ecological theory with observational studies to improve our understanding of the trait-environment relationships underlying niche dynamics in space and time.
As an advocate for community science, I have a special interest in the development of frameworks supporting a networked approach to biodiversity research and monitoring. This work began with the Biodiversity Galiano project and continues through the organization I co-founded with friends and colleagues: the Institute for Multidisciplinary Ecological Research in the Salish Sea. Check out Andrew's personal website here. |
PhD Student: Maggie Slein (she/her)
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PhD Student: Keila Stark (she/her)Accurately predicting how marine faunal populations will respond to warming seas is critical to informing management plans. An existing approach to achieving this is modeling future species distributions based on estimated thermal tolerance ranges from current distributions, however this misses other ecological pathways (ie. trophic) through which warming might affect a taxon of interest. I am interested in investigating how warming might influence the abundance and distribution of Arctic char (Salvelinus alpinus) via temperature effects on its prey abundance through trophic and metabolic theory of ecology frameworks.
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Postdoctoral Research Fellows
David Anderson, PhD
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Tess Grainger, PhD (she/her)
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Mélanie-Louise Leblanc, PhD (she/her)
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Research Affiliates & Lab Technicians
Jessica Garzke, PhD
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Carling Gerlinksy (she/her)
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Miranda MacGillivray
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Fruin Pow (he/they)
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Lara Rovers
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