The Maintenance of Biological Diversity

We study the processes that enable species to persist through time, which are those responsible for the maintenance of biological diversity. Specifically, we investigate how historical, evolutionary and ecological process interact to govern community assembly and species coexistence. We pay particular attention to those processes that shape the structure of species pools, and how they trickle down to influence the structure of local communities.
species pools

 

Relevant references

Savary P*, Lessard JP, Peres-Neto PR. (2023) Heterogeneous dispersal networks to improve biodiversity science. Trends in Ecology and Evolution

Schmidt C, Muñoz G*, Lancaster LT, Lessard JP, Marske KA, Marshall KE, Garroway CJ. (2022) Population demography maintains biogeographic boundaries. Ecology Letters 25: 19051913 

Marjakangas EL, Muñoz G*, Turney S*, Albrecht J, Neuschulz EL, Schleuning M, Lessard JP. (2022) Trait-based inference of ecological network assembly: a conceptual framework and methodological toolbox. Ecological Monographs 92(2): e1502

Hebert K*, Millien V, Lessard JP. (2021) Source pool diversity and proximity shape the compositional uniqueness of insular mammal assemblages worldwide. Journal of Biogeography 48: 2337-2349

Lessard JP, Weinstein B, Borregaard MK, Marske KA, Rojas, D, McGuire JA, Parra JL, Rahbek C, Graham CH. (2016) Process-based species pools reveal the hidden signature of biotic interactions amid the influence of temperature filtering. The American Naturalist 187: 75-88.

Blonder B, Nogués-Bravo D, Borregaard MK, Donoghue J, Jørgensen PM, Kraft NJB, Lessard JP, Morueta-Holme N, Sandel B, Svenning JC, Violle C, Rahbek C, Enquist BJ. (2015) Linking environmental filtering and disequilibrium to biogeography with a community climate framework. Ecology 96:972-985. 

Fabre PH, Moltensen M, Fjeldså J, Irestedt M, Lessard JP and Jønsson KA. (2014) Multiple waves of colonization by monarch flycatchers across the Indo-Pacific and their implications for coexistence and speciation. Journal of Biogeography 41:274-286.

Carstensen DW, Lessard JP, Borregaard MK, Holt BG, Rahbek C. (2013) Introducing the biogeographic species pool. Ecography 36:1310-1318.

Lessard JP, Belmaker J, Myers JA, Chase JM, Rahbek C. (2012) Inferring local ecological processes amid species-pool influences. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 27: 600-607.

Lessard JP, Borregaard MK, Fordyce JA, Rahbek C, Weiser MD, Dunn RR, Sanders NJ. (2012) Strong influence of regional species pools on continent-wide structuring of local communities. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 279: 266-274.