Research topics

Diversity in time and space: integrating across fossil and living mammalian species

This research topic focuses on the evolution and ecology of large mammals through the Cenozoic until today. Here, we bring together paleontological and geological data on past environmental conditions and extinct species with present-day data on the current environment and living species. Recent work has focussed on the excellent fossil record of large mammals in the Northern Hemisphere, contrasting the Neogene (approximately 23-2 million years ago) to today.

Such comparisons enable us to assess the stability of ecological relationships over geological timescales, to understand the evolutionary history underlying present-day diversity, and to generate a deep-time baseline for measuring the consequences of ongoing and future biodiversity loss. How do diversity patterns in time and space depend on abiotic drivers such as climate, or on anthropogenic drivers like land use? How do traits evolve and change through time, and how is trait evolution influenced by environmental changes?

Team: Prof. Dr. Susanne Fritz, Dr. Shan Huang, Dr. Niels Meijer; ongoing cooperation in the VeWA project and with other SBiK-F research groups: Paleoclimate and Paleoenvironment Dynamics and Quantative Biogeography

Macroevolution of ecological niches and seasonal migration in birds

In this research theme, we primarily investigate the evolutionary and ecological processes that shape species` ecological niches across multiple species. The ecological niche is a concept describing all abiotic and biotic conditions where a species can survive and reproduce. In particular, we study the climatic niche, which describes the climatic conditions that a species can be found in and is particularly relevant for projecting the responses of species to ongoing and future climate change. We also investigate niche partitioning among species using ecomorphological traits; these are morphological adaptations that are important for species’ ecology, such as wing shape for flight performance or beak shape for diet.

Our recent work has focused on comparing migratory and sedentary species of birds, because these experience vastly different climatic conditions throughout the year. Key questions include: Do migratory species track their climatic niches when they move from breeding to wintering areas and vice versa? Is climatic niche evolution across migratory and sedentary birds linked to paleo-climatic conditions? How do ecomorphological traits evolve, and is trait evolution linked to the evolution of climatic niches and the evolution of migratory behaviour?

For more details on this topic, see also the webpage on the Emmy Noether research group awarded to Susanne Fritz (2014-2021)

Team: Prof. Dr. Susanne Fritz; ongoing cooperation with other SBiK-F research groups: Community Ecology and Macroecology and Movement Ecology and Biodiversity Conservation

Macroevolution, macroecology, and biogeography – the big picture

In this research theme, we investigate the effects of evolutionary history, species’ traits, and current and past environmental variation on present-day global or regional patterns of biodiversity. These studies span from empirical analyses of terrestrial vertebrates to conceptual work on how to integrate phylogenetic and spatial information. We also work with geoscientists to investigate the underlying drivers of large-scale diversity patterns, in particular mountain building and climate change; this research often uses diversity dynamics through time inferred from fossil mammals (see also the first research topic above).

Key questions include: Why are some regions so much more species-rich than others? What are the effects of mountain building and climate change on spatial and temporary diversity patters ? How much influence does evolutionary history have on present-day diversity patterns, e.g. signatures of speciation and extinction processes? And how much have paleo-environmental changes shaped present-day diversity patterns?

Team: Prof. Dr. Susanne Fritz, Dr. Shan Huang, Dr. Alke Voskamp

Past, current, and future human impacts on biodiversity

Our research in this theme investigates human impacts on biodiversity today, contrasts these with a deep-time perspective, and generates future projections of biodiversity. Human impacts have changed through the “Anthropocene” (the “Age of Humans”), from subsistence hunting and the starts of agriculture through modern industrial fishing and intensive land use to future impacts of anthropogenic climate change. Our research spans across these topics, e.g. assessments of how recent biodiversity loss has changed ecological relationships over geological timescales, or projections of species’ geographic distributions under future climate and land-use change.

Key questions include: Why are some species and clades more threatened than others? How do anthropogenic threats interact with biological differences in species’ susceptibility based on their ecology and traits? How will the spatial distribution of diversity change under future climate and land-use change? Which species traits are commonly associated with high extinction risk from habitat loss, climate change, or overexploitation?

Team: Prof. Dr. Susanne Fritz, Larissa Nowak, Dr. Alke Voskamp: ongoing cooperation with other SBiK-F research groups: Community Ecology and Macroecology and Movement Ecology and Biodiversity Conservation