Faculty Sponsor: Jon Witman

In order to anticipate the likely effects of climate change and other anthropogenic forces on biodiversity, it is important to understand the processes that determine the abundance and coexistence of species. These processes depend on ecological similarity of species, which are often correlated to relatedness. Phylogenetic relatedness can be easier to quantify than other measures of ecological similarity, especially in high biodiversity environments. Mara used mathematical models of ideal communities to understand how phylogenetic patterns, called phylogenetic community structure, can be measured to infer what forces (competition, environmental factors, or a combination) are structuring communities.