BEE: IMEMEBA Workshop: Insights from Macro-Ecology and Macro-Evolution for Biodiversity Assessment

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The Earth’s ecosystems are under serious threat due to ongoing stressors of the Anthropocene. Presently, we have no reliable way to assess the overall health of an ecosystem, and the biodiversity therein, let alone to identify thresholds of change beyond which a complex ecosystem cannot recover. Much needed are insights into how patterns of species diversity that we understand to emerge at small scales are propagated up to shape entire ecosystems: What are the drivers, and what aspects impart resilience to perturbations such as those from invasive species or climate change? Three rather disparate research areas have started to examine how large scale ecological and evolutionary patterns emerge through time, notably in the context of fossils, where changes in communities can be studied through the geological record; remote archipelagoes in which different ages of component islands can be used as snapshots of community composition through geological time; and microbial systems, where large scale patterns emerge relatively quickly. This project brings researchers from these different disciplines together, along with others who are developing theory focused on emergent patterns that can apply to any or all of these systems. The primary goal is to identify commonalities across systems and build a unified theory that describes large scale patterns of ecosystems and attributes that promote resiliency to change. The outcomes will have broad societal impact for understanding ecosystem response to changing climate. In addition, the workshop will contribute to the training and scholarly advancement of diverse early career investigators.The project has three organizers and an additional six core participants. There will be a preliminary planning workshop held for the core participants. This small workshop will be short and focused, based at Blue Oak Field Station, California in Fall 2021, and geared towards expanding on concepts at the intersection of the different disciplines and planning for the main workshop. The primary workshop will be held at Schoodic, Maine and will be longer, larger, and more integrative, tentatively scheduled for June 7-13, 2022. For the main workshop the organizers have identified 30 key participants who are active in developing insights into large scale ecological and evolutionary properties within each of the fields of paleoecology, island community ecology, and microbial systems, as well as researchers who are developing theory at the intersection of these disciplines. Participants have been targeted with an eye to gender equality and diversity of career stages. For the primary workshop, eight slots have been reserved for applications from graduate students and early career scientists.This workshop was funded through the Bridging Ecology and Evolution category in the Biological Sciences Directorate, Division of Environmental Biology.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.