Ecology & Evolutionary Biology · UCLA
WEBS Group
Wholistic Ecoinformatics for Biodiversity Science
We are a team of quantitative ecologists asking how biodiversity persists in a changing world. Ecological communities are too complex to observe in full and too important to get wrong, so we look for principles that still hold when much of the system is out of view.
Theory
We develop rigorous theory with tools from geometry, statistical physics, topology and information theory.
Metrics
We turn that theory into measures that work with the incomplete data that monitoring programs can collect.
Data
We test both against field surveys, experiments and global compilations, from the Arctic to the tropics.
Research
What we work on
Testing ecological models
Which models deserve to survive when much of the system is hidden?
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Coexistence of many species
How do many species coexist, and when do changing conditions tip them over?
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Assembly and priority effects
Does the order in which species arrive decide the community that forms?
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Geometry and physics of communities
What do geometry and physics reveal about how communities respond to change?
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Monitoring and global change
How little must we observe, and how are communities responding to invasions, land use and fire?
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Ecology meets evolution
How do ecological and evolutionary change shape each other?
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Research atlas
The systems behind our research
We love working with collaborators who bring deep knowledge of their ecosystems and fresh perspectives on our shared questions.
From Arctic pollinators to tropical forests and microbial communities, these partnerships connect ecological theory with the richness of the living world. Explore the places and studies that inspire our work.
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Map: Leaflet. Land: Natural Earth. Relief: GLCNMO2008 (Tateishi et al. 2014), Geospatial Information Authority of Japan, Chiba University and collaborating organizations. Map data.