Joined the PlosOne editorial team as an academic editor!

I am a big fan of open access publishing and in particular, the Plos journals. To support the trend I have just joined the PlosOne team as an Academic Editor!

Japan!

Just got back from a conference in Sendai, Japan: "Ecosystem Management Applying to Ecosystem Adaptability Science: Robustness and stability of organisims and ecosystems". This conference was just incredible - 25 speakers, 5 days, great science, and good friends! Here is a shot of Kevin McCann and I taking a nature walk on one of our afternoons off. I would like to thank Hiroko and all the conference organizers for inviting me. One of the best conferences I can remember! (The other dude is Macaca fuscata - a trip to Japan is nothing without a side-trip to see the snow monkeys!

Honors students at the Cameron Conference

Kristen Vandenburg, Karla Armsworthy, Jennifer Malcolm, Vanessa Brisson, and Cashelle Farley presenting their research at the annual Cameron Conference for honors students.

Mediterranean Is Scary Laboratory of Ocean Futures

Press In Wired Science


“It’s difficult to know exactly what’s going to happen elsewhere, but the principles can be extrapolated,” said Marta Call, a Dalhousie University marine biologist who has modeled the interactions of Mediterranean species. In a paper published last year in Ecosystems, she and her colleagues described Mediterranean food webs as “in an advanced state of degradation.”

Read More http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/12/mediterranean-degradation/#ixzz0cLBT4twl

“Structural Degradation in Mediterranean Sea Food Webs: Testing Ecological Hypotheses Using Stochastic and Mass-Balance Modelling.” By Marta Coll, Heike K. Lotze, and Tamara N. Romanuk. Ecosystems, Vol. 11 No. 6, Sept. 2008.

Mather Carscallen Joins the FWL

Mather Carscallen has been working with us for nearly three years now and this January formally joins us as an M.Sc student. He is working on polar food webs and the potential consequences of climate change on food web structure in the Arctic and Antarctic. Welcome Mather!

What to do when you get invited to give a talk?

Take the lab on a road trip of course. Tamara, Connie, Veronik, Catherine, and Marina celebrating the end of a term in New Brunswick.

Kayla Hamelin at the USRA poster session

"The Tangled Web: Who eats whom in the Nova Scotia rock pools" - by far the coolest poster at the session:)

Congrats Dr. Berreville

This week at the food web lab has been pretty exciting. Olivier Berreville defended his PHD thesis "Modelling the Structure and Seasonal Evolution of Planktonic Food Webs
in Arctic Polynyas" and passed with ease. Congrats Olivier - we all look forward to you joining the lab as our new Postdoctoral Associate!

I am a cool scientist!

Check out my interview at "Dive Into Your Imagination"...
Thanks Annie!

New Honors Students 2009/2010

The lab is busting at the seams! Karla Armsworthy, Jennifer Malcolm, Vanessa Brisson, Kristen Vandenburg and Cashelle Farley are doing their honors work in the food web lab this year.

New Graduate Students

Two new graduate students have joined the food web lab this year. Marina Ritchie did her undergraduate work at Dal as is going to be working on the human microbiome project. Catherine Sutherland comes to us from U of C and will be working on something webby. Welcome to both!

Canadian Society for Ecology and Evolution 2009 Meeting

Yours truly co-chaired the Canadian Society for Ecology and Evolution Meeting this year at Dalhousie (along with Dr. Sina Adl, and a heap of amazing volunteers, whom I would like to thank for all their amazing heroics). For details of this great meeting (which was also held in conjunction with the Genetics Society of Canada) check out the meeting report in Biology Letters.

Experimental Photography II

 

 

 

 

Experimental Photography

 

 

 

Upcoming Talks

February 21-24th, 2010, at Ecosystem Management applying to ecosystem adaptability science: I. Robustness and stability of organisms and ecosystems” in Sendai, Japan.
March 26, 2010. Saint Marys University, Halifax, NS (Host: Jeremy Lundholm)
April 6th, 2010 Guelph (Host: Kevin McCann)
Past Talks
December 4th, 2009, University of New Brunswick
February 16th, University of Potsdam, Berlin, Germany "Species Invasions in Complex Ecological Networks" Hosts: Dr. Neo Martinez and Dr. Ursula Gaedke
February 23rd, Darmstadt University of Technology, Germany "Species Invasions in Complex Ecological Networks" Host: Dr. Ulrich Brose
February 25th, University of Sheffield, England "Species Invasions in Complex Ecological Networks" Host: Dr. Owen Petchey
March 30th, PIMS Mathematical Biology Seminar Series, University of Alberta "Species Invasions in Complex Ecological Networks" Host: Dr. Mark Lewis

Predicting invasion success in complex ecological networks

In a special issue on "Food Webs"
This paper was ranked the 33rd most read article in June 2009 in Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B
BY...

* Tamara N. Romanuk,
* Yun Zhou,
* Ulrich Brose,
* Eric L. Berlow,
* Richard J. Williams,
* and Neo D. Martinez

Predicting invasion success in complex ecological networks. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B June 27, 2009 364:1743-1754; doi:10.1098/rstb.2008.0286

A recent publication

Coll, M., H.K. Lotze, and T.N. Romanuk. 2008.
Structural degradation in Mediterranean Sea food webs: testing ecological hypotheses using stochastic and mass-balance modelling.
Ecosystems

Recruiting NSERC USRA's for Summer 2009

I am currently looking for 1 or 2 NSERC USRA's to conduct research in my lab this summer on the community composition of rock pool meiofaunal communities from Nova Scotia, Churchill, and Bermuda. USRA's will learn techniques related to species identification of a wide variety of meiofaunal invertebrates, field techniques, and data-analysis. You will also get to be involved in a wide range of graduate student research projects looking at extinction dynamics, and the effects of climate change on food-web structure.

New Graduate Students!

Constance Tuck and Veronik Campbell are starting their masters programs with me at the foodweb lab this September. Constance (or Connie) was a 4th year honors student in my lab back in 2006/2007 and also did a special topics project with me in Fall 2007. Connie will be looking at how temperature variability affects food web structure and stability.



CAPTION: Tamara, Connie, Veronik, and April at Prospect Point, Nova Scotia



Veronik came to out to visit from McGill University this past Spring and decided to join the Foodweb lab. We think it was because of the amazing trip we took out to our rock pools at Prospect Point, about 40min from Halifax. Veronik will be looking at the consequences of species loss in food webs, specifically at whether it matters what trophic role a species plays in the food web in terms of how stable that community is over time.

Sneak Peek at the Bermuda Rock Pools

Just missing a Hurricane (well, we will find out in a day or two for sure) Matt, Kate, and Caitlin are intrepidity braving the wilds of Bermuda and BIOS to track down the elusive Bermudian rock pool. A few sneaks peek at the pools....




The lay of the land...


Matt diving into a rock pool (just kidding!)


A pool...

Con"grad"ulations to the special topics students of 2008!

This year has been a whirlwind of fabulous student projects. Thanks to all of you who participated in the lab and for the great work that came out of it!














Greg (aka Matt, the skipper) Lynch looked at seasonal variation in patterns of community composition of temperate rock pools...














Kate MacPhee tackled community abundance patterns in Arctic rock pools...














William (aka Mather) Carscallen got webby in the Arctic and Antarctic assembling marine coastal food-webs (the Antarctic ones have more species by the way...can anyone say fishing pressure?)













Alyssa Byers-Heinlein revealed the hierarchical nature of the human food web anticipating with considerable foresight a new study from SFI researcher Mark Newman and colleagues on the hierarchical nature of networks...














and Constance (Connie) Tuck tested her Mangrove food-webs against another labs food-web assembly using the same classic dataset...

Sharky research in the food-web lab

Christine Ward-Paige (PhD student) and I have been island hopping in Thailand after a very successful ADEX (Asian Dive Exhibition) meeting in Singapore -- searching for sharks and the divemasters that see them. Our research here, which is part of the Global Shark Assessment, has been to "ground-truth" Christine's Historical Sighting Survey. So far we had interviewed divemasters and instructors in Koh Lanta, Krabi, Koh Tao, Koh Pangang, and Koh Samui. It has been a great research trip. Here are some highlights:
*the mysteries of the sharks ID's at Chumpon Pinnacles (grey reef or bull sharks?)
*snorkeling with black tips on Koh Tao at the Black Tip Dive Resort"
*a manta ray sighting at Koh Phi Phi
*meeting the Misool Eco Resort Team in Raja Ampat (who are starting an amazing conservation center which they hope will host students and researchers. These very eco-forward thinking conservationists have worked with local people to protect 200km of reef in the region and have set up a Marine Protected Area).

Press!
*wildsingapore
*bymnews

Congradulations to the honors students of 2008!

Species invasions, trophic cascades, metabolic theory, and stability OH MY! great work everyone ! Its been a year of firsts....

Kevin (aka Tom) Hargadon, in his stellar thesis "Investigating the impact of top predator removal on lower trophic level abundance and ecosystem function in temperate and tropical aquatic microcosms" showed that removal of top predators results causes trophic cascades in rock pool food-webs...






Andrew McMillan, in his thesis "Trends in facilitation of successful invasion by previously established invaders" delved into world of species invasions and showed that direct positive interactions are more likley in terrestrial systems while indirect positive interactions are more likley in aquatic systems....










Angela Young, in her thesis "The Effects of Environmental Stress on the Relationship between Diversity and Stability in Temperate Rock Pools" showed that when more functional groups are present populations are more stable...






Matthew Beck, in his thesis "The effects of temperature and nutrient availability on the respiration rate of invertebrate rock pool ecosystems" showed that cold adapted species respond more strongly to change in environmental temperature than tropical species...