News from the Computational Ecology Lab

Last week I had the pleasure to contribute to The John Prince Research Forest’s community Open House event at Fort St. James, Canada.

The event welcomed everyone from the surrounding communities and a-far to learn more about the ongoing and past research done at the organisation. This included countless research projects taken on by students, including my own; What drives the spatial overlap between moose and elk?

It was great to be able to discuss my project with the local community, and to learn more from them about the surrounding area. With affiliated researchers and students to the John Prince Research Forest in attendance, discussions about the huge diversity of projects being conducted at the study area was far from scarce.

Overall a fantastic evening!

Last week I attended for the first time the Annual Meeting of the Ecological Society of Japan in Kyoto. It was a very interesting conference with many presentations ranging from theoretical ecology to biodiversity and conservation, and the latest findings on biodiversity-stability relationships.

The conference was held in 2 different venues, which was great to explore different parts of the city of Kyoto. The first part of the conference was held in the Yoshida-South Campus of the University of Kyoto. A very nice student-vibe atmosphere with lots going on in the surroundings and close to the Kyoto river.

Towards the end we moved to the Kyoto International Conference Centre, where the poster session took place and provided a great opportunity to chat to different students about their current projects and browse around many interesting projects going on across Japan.

Today I did my invited general audience seminar at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) entitled: What can we learn from the tangled bank? The network organisation of ecological systems. After a very nice introduction by Dave Armitage, head of the Integrative Community Ecology Unit at OIST, I went right into business and gave an overview of the work we have done, and continue to do, in the lab. I drew on examples from our work on spatial scaling, terrestrial avian food webs, and the microbiome all within the context of classical ecology from Hutchinson and the niche to May and ecosystem stability. Towards the end of the talk I also presented our recent work on the eco-evolutionary dynamics of complex networks with multiple interaction types.

At the end of the talk there were many thought-provoking questions and further discussions sparked by the talk. As a result I will continue discussing this during my time left at OIST with students and staff members who expressed interest in our work!

Special thanks of course go to my friend and collaborator Nuria (Galiana), and my PhD students and postdoc: Abby, Lucie, and Gui, without whom none of what I presented would have been possible. And of course thanks to the TSVP for organising!

The research I presented in this talk was partly funded by the Leverhulme Trust.

This year, for a few months, I am developing my research at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST), a truly amazing place to conduct interdisciplinary research and experience the Japanese culture.

So far, I have had the opportunity to interact with many scientists working on very interesting topics from the physics of phase transitions in Cacio e Pepe pasta to the philosophical implications of current and short term future developments of artificial superintelligence.

Resident researchers have been very welcoming. I have been given the chance to showcase my research at the Ravasi and Armitage units lab meetings. I have also had very interesting discussions on the behaviour of complex dynamical systems, the effects of disturbances on the response diversity of complex ecosystems, how to look a the dynamics of ranks to better understand community compositional changes, all the way to the functional and genetic richness of the marine environment. All this in the inspiring atmosphere of cutting edge research facilities and a great scientific environment.

I have also joined a team of scientists in the field, visiting some interesting research sites part of the Okinawa Environmental Observation Network (OKEON) that monitors, among other things, the soundscape of Okinawa’s habitats. Using their acoustic monitoring, scientists at OIST can understand changes in community composition. Excitingly, we have been thinking together how to build networks of interactions between bird species and how their structure is affected by environmental conditions. I’m excited to see where that research direction takes us.

As part of the programme that made my visit possible, the Theoretical Sciences Visiting Program I have been invited to give a talk about the research with do in the lab for general audiences. So, on Friday 6th of March I will talk about: What can we learn from the tangled bank? The networked organisation of ecological systems.

I’m very much looking forward to sharing our research with the staff and students at OIST!

And of course, it is always nice to take some time to enjoy other activities. People are super friendly in Okinawa, and they have welcomed me warmly in their basketball and baseball teams as well as taking me around to do some diving and birdwatching around the island - including seeing a few lifers :)

I’m very grateful to everyone at OIST for making my time so enjoyable so far. I’m looking forward to the rest of my visit!

This week I once again had the pleasure to share the lab’s research with scientists from around the world at the Annual Meeting of the BES, this year in Edinburgh!

With countless interesting talks and posters, thematic sessions and just the vibrant atmosphere, this meeting is always a chance to catch up with friends and colleagues on the latest developments of our research and have fun while doing it. This year, I also contributed in other ways by joining a focus group where we discussed the impact of the Annual Meeting on our research and on ecological science. Thanks Rachel for the chance to join this group!

I also chaired a session on Evolutionary Ecology: Plasticity, dispersal and ecological responses which was full of interesting talks and discussions from the impact of adaptive dispersal on population persistence to the evolution of sex ratios in breeding systems.

During my poster presentation on the Coevolutionary drivers of phylosymbiosis and microbiome divergence in host-microbe associations, I had the chance to discuss with several interesting people our ideas on the origins of complex symbioses and how we can develop quantitative mathematical models to better understand them.

Before heading back to Swansea I had some time to check out the Christmas market and other nice sightings in the city centre of Edinburgh. A very nice town! And of course, to head down to the pub, or catch up at the venue, with old friends from all over the world.

Thanks to the Leverhulme Trust (through project grant RPG-2022-114) for the support to attend and present my work at this meeting.