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Book An Introduction to Methods and Models in Ecology  Evolution  and Conservation Biology

Download or read book An Introduction to Methods and Models in Ecology Evolution and Conservation Biology written by Stanton Braude and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2010-01-04 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An innovative introduction to ecology and evolution This unique textbook introduces undergraduate students to quantitative models and methods in ecology, behavioral ecology, evolutionary biology, and conservation. It explores the core concepts shared by these related fields using tools and practical skills such as experimental design, generating phylogenies, basic statistical inference, and persuasive grant writing. And contributors use examples from their own cutting-edge research, providing diverse views to engage students and broaden their understanding. This is the only textbook on the subject featuring a collaborative "active learning" approach that emphasizes hands-on learning. Every chapter has exercises that enable students to work directly with the material at their own pace and in small groups. Each problem includes data presented in a rich array of formats, which students use to answer questions that illustrate patterns, principles, and methods. Topics range from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium and population effective size to optimal foraging and indices of biodiversity. The book also includes a comprehensive glossary. In addition to the editors, the contributors are James Beck, Cawas Behram Engineer, John Gaskin, Luke Harmon, Jon Hess, Jason Kolbe, Kenneth H. Kozak, Robert J. Robertson, Emily Silverman, Beth Sparks-Jackson, and Anton Weisstein. Provides experience with hypothesis testing, experimental design, and scientific reasoning Covers core quantitative models and methods in ecology, behavioral ecology, evolutionary biology, and conservation Turns "discussion sections" into "thinking labs" Professors: A supplementary Instructor's Manual is available for this book. It is restricted to teachers using the text in courses. For information on how to obtain a copy, refer to: http://press.princeton.edu/class_use/solutions.html

Book Instructor   s Manual for an Introduction to Methods and Models in Ecology

Download or read book Instructor s Manual for an Introduction to Methods and Models in Ecology written by Stanton Braude and published by . This book was released on 2010-01-01 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book A Biologist s Guide to Mathematical Modeling in Ecology and Evolution

Download or read book A Biologist s Guide to Mathematical Modeling in Ecology and Evolution written by Sarah P. Otto and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2011-09-19 with total page 745 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thirty years ago, biologists could get by with a rudimentary grasp of mathematics and modeling. Not so today. In seeking to answer fundamental questions about how biological systems function and change over time, the modern biologist is as likely to rely on sophisticated mathematical and computer-based models as traditional fieldwork. In this book, Sarah Otto and Troy Day provide biology students with the tools necessary to both interpret models and to build their own. The book starts at an elementary level of mathematical modeling, assuming that the reader has had high school mathematics and first-year calculus. Otto and Day then gradually build in depth and complexity, from classic models in ecology and evolution to more intricate class-structured and probabilistic models. The authors provide primers with instructive exercises to introduce readers to the more advanced subjects of linear algebra and probability theory. Through examples, they describe how models have been used to understand such topics as the spread of HIV, chaos, the age structure of a country, speciation, and extinction. Ecologists and evolutionary biologists today need enough mathematical training to be able to assess the power and limits of biological models and to develop theories and models themselves. This innovative book will be an indispensable guide to the world of mathematical models for the next generation of biologists. A how-to guide for developing new mathematical models in biology Provides step-by-step recipes for constructing and analyzing models Interesting biological applications Explores classical models in ecology and evolution Questions at the end of every chapter Primers cover important mathematical topics Exercises with answers Appendixes summarize useful rules Labs and advanced material available

Book Dynamic State Variable Models in Ecology

Download or read book Dynamic State Variable Models in Ecology written by Colin W. Clark and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2000-02-10 with total page 302 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book introduces readers to a set of powerful and extremely flexible modeling techniques, starting at "square one" and continuing with carefully chosen applications. Some of these applications of methodology include insect oviposition behavior, overwinter survival of birds and fish, avian migration, resource management, conservation biology, agroecology, and human behavior. This book also explains how to construct, test, and use dynamic state variable models in a wide range of contexts in evolutionary ecology, and its complete and up-to-date coverage allows readers to immediately begin using the described techniques. Dynamic State Variable Models in Ecology is designed for self-instruction or for use in upper division undergraduate or graduate courses. It is ideal for students and scientists interested in behavior, ecology, anthropology, conservation biology, and related fields.

Book An Introduction to Mathematical Models in Ecology and Evolution

Download or read book An Introduction to Mathematical Models in Ecology and Evolution written by Mike Gillman and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2009-04-08 with total page 168 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Students often find it difficult to grasp fundamental ecologicaland evolutionary concepts because of their inherently mathematicalnature. Likewise, the application of ecological and evolutionarytheory often requires a high degree of mathematical competence. This book is a first step to addressing these difficulties,providing a broad introduction to the key methods and underlyingconcepts of mathematical models in ecology and evolution. The bookis intended to serve the needs of undergraduate and postgraduateecology and evolution students who need to access the mathematicaland statistical modelling literature essential to theirsubjects. The book assumes minimal mathematics and statistics knowledgewhilst covering a wide variety of methods, many of which are at thefore-front of ecological and evolutionary research. The book alsohighlights the applications of modelling to practical problems suchas sustainable harvesting and biological control. Key features: Written clearly and succinctly, requiring minimal in-depthknowledge of mathematics Introduces students to the use of computer models in bothfields of ecology and evolutionary biology Market - senior undergraduate students and beginningpostgraduates in ecology and evolutionary biology

Book Evolutionary Conservation Biology

Download or read book Evolutionary Conservation Biology written by Régis Ferrière and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2004-06-10 with total page 447 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As anthropogenic environmental changes spread and intensify across the planet, conservation biologists have to analyze dynamics at large spatial and temporal scales. Ecological and evolutionary processes are then closely intertwined. In particular, evolutionary responses to anthropogenic environmental change can be so fast and pronounced that conservation biology can no longer afford to ignore them. To tackle this challenge, areas of conservation biology that are disparate ought to be integrated into a unified framework. Bringing together conservation genetics, demography, and ecology, this book introduces evolutionary conservation biology as an integrative approach to managing species in conjunction with ecological interactions and evolutionary processes. Which characteristics of species and which features of environmental change foster or hinder evolutionary responses in ecological systems? How do such responses affect population viability, community dynamics, and ecosystem functioning? Under which conditions will evolutionary responses ameliorate, rather than worsen, the impact of environmental change?

Book Conservation Biology

    Book Details:
  • Author : Scott P. Carroll
  • Publisher : Oxford University Press
  • Release : 2008
  • ISBN : 0195306791
  • Pages : 393 pages

Download or read book Conservation Biology written by Scott P. Carroll and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2008 with total page 393 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This edited volume will provide a treatment of evolutionary conservation biology that introduces and explains major concepts and also unifies recent theoretical and empirical advances.

Book An Introduction to Mathematical Models in Ecology and Evolution

Download or read book An Introduction to Mathematical Models in Ecology and Evolution written by Mike Gillman and published by Wiley-Blackwell. This book was released on 2009-04-20 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Students often find it difficult to grasp fundamental ecological and evolutionary concepts because of their inherently mathematical nature. Likewise, the application of ecological and evolutionary theory often requires a high degree of mathematical competence. This book is a first step to addressing these difficulties, providing a broad introduction to the key methods and underlying concepts of mathematical models in ecology and evolution. The book is intended to serve the needs of undergraduate and postgraduate ecology and evolution students who need to access the mathematical and statistical modelling literature essential to their subjects. The book assumes minimal mathematics and statistics knowledge whilst covering a wide variety of methods, many of which are at the fore-front of ecological and evolutionary research. The book also highlights the applications of modelling to practical problems such as sustainable harvesting and biological control. Key features: Written clearly and succinctly, requiring minimal in-depth knowledge of mathematics Introduces students to the use of computer models in both fields of ecology and evolutionary biology Market - senior undergraduate students and beginning postgraduates in ecology and evolutionary biology

Book Phylogenies in Ecology

    Book Details:
  • Author : Marc W. Cadotte
  • Publisher : Princeton University Press
  • Release : 2016-08-09
  • ISBN : 0691157685
  • Pages : 264 pages

Download or read book Phylogenies in Ecology written by Marc W. Cadotte and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2016-08-09 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Phylogenies in Ecology is the first book to critically review the application of phylogenetic methods in ecology, and it serves as a primer to working ecologists and students of ecology wishing to understand these methods. This book demonstrates how phylogenetic information is transforming ecology by offering fresh ways to estimate the similarities and differences among species, and by providing deeper, evolutionary-based insights on species distributions, coexistence, and niche partitioning. Marc Cadotte and Jonathan Davies examine this emerging area's explosive growth, allowing for this new body of hypotheses testing. Cadotte and Davies systematically look at all the main areas of current ecophylogenetic methodology, testing, and inference. Each chapter of their book covers a unique topic, emphasizes key assumptions, and introduces the appropriate statistical methods and null models required for testing phylogenetically informed hypotheses. The applications presented throughout are supported and connected by examples relying on real-world data that have been analyzed using the open-source programming language, R. Showing how phylogenetic methods are shedding light on fundamental ecological questions related to species coexistence, conservation, and global change, Phylogenies in Ecology will interest anyone who thinks that evolution might be important in their data.

Book Conservation Biology for All

Download or read book Conservation Biology for All written by Navjot S. Sodhi and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2010-01-08 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Conservation Biology for All provides cutting-edge but basic conservation science to a global readership. A series of authoritative chapters have been written by the top names in conservation biology with the principal aim of disseminating cutting-edge conservation knowledge as widely as possible. Important topics such as balancing conversion and human needs, climate change, conservation planning, designing and analyzing conservation research, ecosystem services, endangered species management, extinctions, fire, habitat loss, and invasive species are covered. Numerous textboxes describing additional relevant material or case studies are also included. The global biodiversity crisis is now unstoppable; what can be saved in the developing world will require an educated constituency in both the developing and developed world. Habitat loss is particularly acute in developing countries, which is of special concern because it tends to be these locations where the greatest species diversity and richest centres of endemism are to be found. Sadly, developing world conservation scientists have found it difficult to access an authoritative textbook, which is particularly ironic since it is these countries where the potential benefits of knowledge application are greatest. There is now an urgent need to educate the next generation of scientists in developing countries, so that they are in a better position to protect their natural resources.

Book Handbook of Meta analysis in Ecology and Evolution

Download or read book Handbook of Meta analysis in Ecology and Evolution written by Julia Koricheva and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-04-21 with total page 520 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Meta-analysis is a powerful statistical methodology for synthesizing research evidence across independent studies. This is the first comprehensive handbook of meta-analysis written specifically for ecologists and evolutionary biologists, and it provides an invaluable introduction for beginners as well as an up-to-date guide for experienced meta-analysts. The chapters, written by renowned experts, walk readers through every step of meta-analysis, from problem formulation to the presentation of the results. The handbook identifies both the advantages of using meta-analysis for research synthesis and the potential pitfalls and limitations of meta-analysis (including when it should not be used). Different approaches to carrying out a meta-analysis are described, and include moment and least-square, maximum likelihood, and Bayesian approaches, all illustrated using worked examples based on real biological datasets. This one-of-a-kind resource is uniquely tailored to the biological sciences, and will provide an invaluable text for practitioners from graduate students and senior scientists to policymakers in conservation and environmental management. Walks you through every step of carrying out a meta-analysis in ecology and evolutionary biology, from problem formulation to result presentation Brings together experts from a broad range of fields Shows how to avoid, minimize, or resolve pitfalls such as missing data, publication bias, varying data quality, nonindependence of observations, and phylogenetic dependencies among species Helps you choose the right software Draws on numerous examples based on real biological datasets

Book Ecological Models and Data in R

Download or read book Ecological Models and Data in R written by Benjamin M. Bolker and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2008-07-21 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Introduction and background; Exploratory data analysis and graphics; Deterministic functions for ecological modeling; Probability and stochastic distributions for ecological modeling; Stochatsic simulation and power analysis; Likelihood and all that; Optimization and all that; Likelihood examples; Standar statistics revisited; Modeling variance; Dynamic models.

Book The Princeton Guide to Evolution

Download or read book The Princeton Guide to Evolution written by David A. Baum and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2017-03-21 with total page 886 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The essential one-volume reference to evolution The Princeton Guide to Evolution is a comprehensive, concise, and authoritative reference to the major subjects and key concepts in evolutionary biology, from genes to mass extinctions. Edited by a distinguished team of evolutionary biologists, with contributions from leading researchers, the guide contains some 100 clear, accurate, and up-to-date articles on the most important topics in seven major areas: phylogenetics and the history of life; selection and adaptation; evolutionary processes; genes, genomes, and phenotypes; speciation and macroevolution; evolution of behavior, society, and humans; and evolution and modern society. Complete with more than 100 illustrations (including eight pages in color), glossaries of key terms, suggestions for further reading on each topic, and an index, this is an essential volume for undergraduate and graduate students, scientists in related fields, and anyone else with a serious interest in evolution. Explains key topics in some 100 concise and authoritative articles written by a team of leading evolutionary biologists Contains more than 100 illustrations, including eight pages in color Each article includes an outline, glossary, bibliography, and cross-references Covers phylogenetics and the history of life; selection and adaptation; evolutionary processes; genes, genomes, and phenotypes; speciation and macroevolution; evolution of behavior, society, and humans; and evolution and modern society

Book How Evolution Shapes Our Lives

Download or read book How Evolution Shapes Our Lives written by Jonathan B. Losos and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2016-07-26 with total page 410 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An authoritative exploration of why understanding evolution is crucial to human life today It is easy to think of evolution as something that happened long ago, or that occurs only in "nature," or that is so slow that its ongoing impact is virtually nonexistent when viewed from the perspective of a single human lifetime. But we now know that when natural selection is strong, evolutionary change can be very rapid. In this book, some of the world's leading scientists explore the implications of this reality for human life and society. With some twenty-three essays, this volume provides authoritative yet accessible explorations of why understanding evolution is crucial to human life—from dealing with climate change and ensuring our food supply, health, and economic survival to developing a richer and more accurate comprehension of society, culture, and even what it means to be human itself. Combining new essays with essays revised and updated from the acclaimed Princeton Guide to Evolution, this collection addresses the role of evolution in aging, cognition, cooperation, religion, the media, engineering, computer science, and many other areas. The result is a compelling and important book about how evolution matters to humans today. The contributors are Dan I. Andersson, Francisco J. Ayala, Amy Cavanaugh, Cameron R. Currie, Dieter Ebert, Andrew D. Ellington, Elizabeth Hannon, John Hawks, Paul Keim, Richard E. Lenski, Tim Lewens, Jonathan B. Losos, Virpi Lummaa, Jacob A. Moorad, Craig Moritz, Martha M. Muñoz, Mark Pagel, Talima Pearson, Robert T. Pennock, Daniel E. L. Promislow, Erik M. Quandt, David C. Queller, Robert C. Richardson, Eugenie C. Scott, H. Bradley Shaffer, Joan E. Strassmann, Alan R. Templeton, Paul E. Turner, and Carl Zimmer.

Book Quantitative Methods for Conservation Biology

Download or read book Quantitative Methods for Conservation Biology written by Scott Ferson and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2006-05-09 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Quantitative methods are needed in conservation biology more than ever as an increasing number of threatened species find their way onto international and national “red lists. ” Objective evaluation of population decline and extinction probability are required for sound decision making. Yet, as our colleague Selina Heppell points out, population viability analysis and other forms of formal risk assessment are underused in policy formation because of data uncertainty and a lack of standardized methodologies and unambiguous criteria (i. e. , “rules of thumb”). Models used in conservation biology range from those that are purely heuristic to some that are highly predictive. Model selection should be dependent on the questions being asked and the data that are available. We need to develop a toolbox of quantitative methods that can help scientists and managers with a wide range of systems and that are subject to varying levels of data uncertainty and environmental variability. The methods outlined in the following chapters represent many of the tools needed to fill that toolbox. When used in conjunction with adaptive management, they should provide information for improved monitoring, risk assessment, and evaluation of management alternatives. The first two chapters describe the application of methods for detecting trends and extinctions from sighting data. Presence/absence data are used in general linear and additive models in Chapters 3 and 4 to predict the extinction proneness of birds and to build habitat models for plants.

Book Discovering Evolutionary Ecology

Download or read book Discovering Evolutionary Ecology written by Peter J. Mayhew and published by Oxford University Press on Demand. This book was released on 2006-01-05 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text provides a concise and readable introduction to evolutionary ecology, a field of questions united by the intermix of evolutionary and ecological knowledge.