Mathematics Colloquia and Seminars

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Description

Biologists have long grappled with how the diversity of natural systems is organized and maintained. One powerful framework in community ecology used to understand coexistence is Modern Coexistence Theory (MCT). MCT applies metrics from dynamical systems theory to understand how ecological factors such as species interactions, environmental fluctuations, and fluctuation of species’ abundance influence the coexistence of competing species. Despite its undeniable influence, most studies are restricted to understanding the coexistence of competitive communities with little to no intraspecific variation. Here, I demonstrate how techniques from MCT can be applied to a wider range of ecological scenarios. First, I show how MCT can be used to understand ecological mechanisms that drive secondary extinctions i.e., when the extinction of one species within a community leads to the extinction of another. Second, I bridge recent mathematical theory and MCT techniques to understand the coexistence of communities with within-species variation. Lastly, I extend MCT to accommodate communities with both competitive and facilitative interactions. These extensions demonstrate how techniques from MCT can be leveraged to understand a wide array of biological mechanisms impacting the dynamics of ecological communities.