Our work focuses on the physiological and evolutionary dimensions of plant ecology that influence community assembly and ecosystem function. We are particularly interested in the genetic and evolutionary basis of variation in plant phenotypes and spectral...
Terrestrial ecosystems have a massive capacity to capture carbon and mitigate anthropogenic global change. However, the build-up of plant and soil carbon pools depends heavily on the ability of plants and their below-ground symbionts to acquire soil...
Our research examines how animals interact with the environment and each other to affect ecosystem processes at landscape scales. We draw on the fields of community and ecosystem ecology, animal behavior, and remote sensing to explore multiple facets of...
My main interest is in understanding the constraints imposed by multi-phase fluxes of water and thermal transport on the extent to which a leaf can open its stomata and regulate transpiration effectively in the context of large variations in solar energy...
Behavioral ecology and evolution, focusing on species interactions such as insect/host plant associations and symbioses between insects and other organisms; life history evolution and systematics of Lepidoptera.
Ecological dynamics of terrestrial plant communities and ecosystems; biosphere-atmosphere interactions; mechanistic models of animal movement.
Research Interests
Biological - Our interests in biology are recent, and as a consequence somewhat desultory. A basic question is to understand "how things work" which leads naturally to physiology. We believe that a practical approach requires a...
My lab is very broadly interested in the evolution of floral morphology. We use molecular, morphological, and phylogenetic approaches to study how flowers have changed over the course of evolutionary time. Research projects in the lab cover a diverse set...
A major goal of evolutionary biology is to understand the process of speciation. Of particular interest is evaluating the role of natural selection in causing diverging populations to become species. Addressing these goals entails investigating...
Professor Michele Holbrook studies the physics and physiology of vascular transport in plants with the goal of understanding how constraints on the movement of water and solutes between soil and leaves influences ecological and evolutionary processes. Dr...