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The general objective of research in my lab is to understand patterns of biological diversity as well as the relationships between these patterns and the ecological and evolutionary processes that have created them. I am committed to applying this understanding to developing effective conservation approaches and to predict effects of changing patterns and processes.
Each conservation situation represents a unique combination of species or community biology and extrinsic threats. A single research approach is not sufficient for all situations. Working on a wide variety of conservation issues has given me the opportunity to apply and integrate techniques from traditionally disparate fields including systematics, population genetics, autecology, synecology, landscape ecology, and restoration ecology. I use these techniques to quantify diversity patterns and examine the implications of these patterns for conservation at a wide range of scales.
Beyond addressing questions related to specific conservation situations I am interested in testing basic assumptions on which much of conservation biology is based. Because it is typically not possible to collect all desirable data on a particular problem in timeframes necessary to contribute to management decisions, practitioners rely on general principles derived from basic assumptions from ecology, population genetics and population biology theory. Verifying the validity of such assumptions is critical to identifying where general principles apply and where acquiring new scientific information is necessary for sound decision-making. It also assesses risks of making decisions without complete information.
Click here if you are looking for the University of Maryland College Park campus plant walk guides created by the students in my Woody Plants for Mid-Atlantic Landscapes class.
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