Plant community ecology, ecophysiology and phylogenetics
I study the ecological and evolutionary forces that structure communities. My research integrates aspects of community ecology, ecophysiology, and community phylogenetics. Recent projects have focused on the forests of lowland Amazonia and plant communities in California. In addition to a focus on species coexistence, my research interests include species responses to climate change and the assembly of regional biotas.
Recent updates
Oct. 2011: Our ideas paper about how a better integration of climate science, phylogenetics and community ecology can help to better predict species responses to climate change is out in Global Change Biology: Pau et al. 2011.
Sept. 2011: Our paper about global patterns of beta-diversity in forests is published today in Science! Links to Kraft et al. 2011, cover image (thanks to Christian Ziegler), and the UBC media release.
Aug. 2011: Just announced: the new NSF-funded ecological synthesis center has been awarded to University of Maryland- see the new SESYNC website here.
May 2011: I've accepted an assistant professor position in the Department of Biology at the University of Maryland, College Park, starting in July 2012. Come visit next time you're in Washington DC!
Feb. 2011: New paper about comparing beta-diversities in situations where alpha diversities differ is out in Ecosphere, Chase et al. 2011, and get the R code for the test here.
Feb. 2011: New paper about the sensitivity of leaf morphology to climate is now online early- Peppe et al. New Phytologist, pdf, or take a look at the Yasuni leaves that went into the analysis here.
November 2010: Check out the Nov. 26th news story and slideshow in Science about oil, 'megadiversity,' and the struggle to protect Yasuní National Park in Ecuador where I work. link
November 2010: The first product of our NCEAS Beta Diversity working group is online early today at Ecology Letters- it provides a handy roadmap to the key differences in the ways that beta diversity has been measured empirically, as well as guidance as to how to match your research questions to an appropriate analysis. Anderson et al., Ecology Letters: pdf; Faculty of 1000 evaluation.
July 2010: A collaboration with Margaret Metz, Rick Condit and Jerome Chave using Bayesian hierarchical models to explore trait-demongraphy correlations is in press: Kraft et al. "The relationship between wood density and mortality rates in a global tropical forest dataset", New Phytologist, online early.
June 2010: In press from the NCEAS distributed graduate seminar on plant traits and climate change: Sandel et al. "Contrasting trait responses in plant communities to experimental and geographic variation in precipitation," New Phytologist, online early.
April 2010: In press from the CTFS traits working group: Wright, Kitajima, Kraft, et al. "Functional traits and the growth-mortality tradeoff in tropical trees", Ecology, preprint.
March 2010: Hot off the press from the NCEAS niche conservatism working group: Buckley, Davies, et al., "Phylogeny, niche conservatism and the latitudinal diversity gradient in mammals", Proceedings of the Royal Soceity B pdf
Jan. 2010: In press at Ecological Monographs: "Functional trait and phylogenetic tests of community assembly across spatial scales in an Amazonian forest" pdf
Jan. 2010: Two papers in press at Diversity and Distributions: "Range size, taxon age, and hotspots of neoendemism in the California flora" and "The geography of climate change: implications for conservation biogeography."
Oct. 2009: Our research in Yasuni, Ecuador was described in a Science magazine essay on the origins of ecological structure.
Oct. 2009: I've just made the move to UBC from UC Berkeley as of Oct 1! Come visit!
Jan. 2009: I filed my diseration in December and started a 9-month postdoc working on Climate Change and the California flora with David Ackerly
Oct. 2008: My paper "Functional traits and niche-based tree community assembly in an Amazonian forest" with Renato Valencia and David Ackerly has been published in the Oct 24th issue of Science online abstract F1000 evaluation
June 2008: Our 2007 paper in AmNat was awarded the 2008 President's Award by the American Society of Naturalists
