Revisiting old papers in ecology and evolution through interviews with their authors
In a paper published in Ecology in 1985, Lenore Fahrig and Gray Merriam presented a model for changes in population sizes in a set of interconnected patches, which predicted that populations in isolated patches will grow at a slower rate and are thus morel likely to go extinct than those in connected patches. Fahrig and … Continue reading Revisiting Fahrig and Merriam 1985
In a paper published in PNAS in 2003, Jordi Bascompte, Pedro Jordano, Carlos Melián and Jens Olesen investigated the structural organisation of 52 mutualistic networks and found them to be highly nested, resulting in communities centred around a smaller core of interactions. Bascompte and colleagues also found that communities that contained a greater number of … Continue reading Revisiting Bascompte et al. 2003
In a paper published in Oecologia in 1980, Richard Shine presented the results of his field and laboratory studies on the "costs" of reproduction in six montane Australian lizards. While there had been many theoretical models of trade-offs between current and future reproduction, Shine's study was one of the first, at that time, to test … Continue reading Revisiting Shine 1980
In a paper published in Trends in Ecology & Evolution in 2000, Robert Colwell and David Lees reviewed the conceptual and empirical literature on the influence of the "mid-domain effect" - geometric constraints in geographic patterns of species richness caused by physiological and physiographical boundaries. Sixteen years after the paper was published, I asked Robert … Continue reading Revisiting Colwell and Lees 2000
In a paper published in Evolution in 1987, Raymond Huey and Albert Bennett presented the results of their comparative analysis of temperature preferences and temperature dependence of running speeds in Australian lygosomid skinks. By chasing lizards down racing tracks at different temperatures, Hue and Bennett showed that coadaptation between thermal preference and thermal dependence of … Continue reading Revisiting Huey and Bennett 1987
In a study published in Nature in 1992, Bart Kempenaers, Geert R. Verheyen, Marleen Van den Broeck, Terry Burke, Christine Van Broeckhoven and André Dhondt showed that female blue tits choose higher-quality males for extra-pair copulations (EPC), providing evidence in support of the genetic quality hypothesis for extra-pair matings. Twenty-five years after the paper was … Continue reading Revisiting Kempenaers et al. 1992
In a study published in Ecology in 1987, Stephen Carpenter and colleagues carried out whole-lake manipulations to show that primary productivity in lakes is regulated both by trophic interactions and abiotic factors. Their findings were considered "revolutionary" because, at the time, lake ecosystems were thought to be primarily under the control of nutrients. Thirty years … Continue reading Revisiting Carpenter et al. 1987
