In case you missed it: @sjgoring's wrap-up and reflections from the International Biogeography Society: http://bit.ly/10E5pdD #ibs13
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This ends Jim Brown's talk, and the #ibs13 meetings! Thanks, all! I learned a ton and had fun, and hope you did, too.
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Brown: If we warm the world and come back in 100kyr, we may see increases in high latitudes; may exceed thermal tolerance in tropics. #ibs13
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Audience suggests if it's that rates are higher in the tropics, is speciation still going up in tropics? #ibs13
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Audience brings up the idea that thermal tolerance and altitudinal ranges are narrower in the tropics; affects dispersal. #ibs13
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Brown: Human language diversity also follows a latitudinal gradient and matches biodiversity gradient: highest in the tropics! #ibs13
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Brown cites Dov Sax's (my postdoc advisor) work on a latitudinal gradient in exotics--- until you hit the tropics. #ibs13
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Brown: Comparisons will help: across environments, organisms, gradients, time, organization. #ibs13
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Brown: These three mechanisms discussed are not mutually exclusive-- a synthesis cannot be too comes if the phenomena are so general. #ibs13
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Brown: Rates of ecological interactions-- parasitism, herbivory, etc. have patterns that support on metabic theory predictions. #ibs13
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Brown: Speciation and diversification rates will likely be explained by metabolic theory: more speciation with warmer T's. #ibs13
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Brown: Performance in organisms often increases exponentially in as T increases to a peak that is very close to the thermal limit. #ibs13
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Brown: Diseases are most virulent and diverse in the tropics. There is also empirical support for Janzen-Connell "enemy" mechanisms. #ibs13
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Ack! Laptop dead, phone dying. Hopefully others can finish tweeting Brown's #ibs13 talk if I cut out!
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Brown: One problem with productivity hypothesis is that NPP and diversity isn't correlated with latitude in the marine record. #ibs13
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Brown: There is a very strong correlation between global NPP and vascular plant diversity. #ibs13
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Brown: Most species in diverse tropical communities are rare. Larger islands have more resources, more species. #ibs13
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Brown: The resource/productivity theory suggests high productivity allows for more resources, therefore more species: pie is bigger. #ibs13
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Brown: We do see that niche conservatism is abandoned on islands-- e.g., we see finches become warblers, herbs become trees! #ibs13
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Brown: There is good evidence that exotic species take their range limits with them. Me: But see my tweets from Regan Early's talk...#ibs13
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Brown: If some lineages can overcome constraints at high latitudes, why not all? What limits diversity there? #ibs13
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Brown: Evidence supports niche conservatism, but to what extent is this due to phylogenetic constraint? Why relaxed on islands? #ibs13
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Brown: There is some support for "out of tropics" theory: first, there are high speciation rates in the tropics. But why? #ibs13
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Brown: Processes 1)Out of tropics w/conservative niches 2)Larger pie can be divided in more pieces, 3) Red queen runs faster when hot #ibs13
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Brown: The mechanisms that underlie these patterns remain poorly understood and controversial. #ibs13
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Brown: The latitudinal gradient of biodiversity is very robust: Species richness increases towards the equator. #ibs13
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Brown starts his talk with a photo of his zoologist mom, who, in 1983 asked him, "why are there so many spp in the tropics?" #ibs13
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Brown coined the term "macroecology," co-wrote the most widely-used textbook on biogeography. Heaney cites his mammals on mtns paper. #ibs13
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Jim Brown (first IBS president!) is receiving the Alfred Russell Wallace Award, and will now give a talk. #ibs13
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The 2015 IBS organizers suggest dedicating a part of the conference to Alexander von Humboldt's work, since he worked in the region. #ibs13
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