Abstract: Plant-animal mutualistic networks sustain terrestrial biodiversity and human food-security. Environmental changes threaten these networks underscoring the urgency for developing predictive theories on the networks' responses to perturbations. This talk will present research conducted by my group and collaborators that seeks to predict the dynamics of plant-pollinator networks. In particular, I will present work on theory predicting: (i) foraging preferences of pollinators measured in the field, (ii) invasion success and impacts on natives, and (iii) interaction rewiring as response to a severe drought. I will end my talk with a different but related subject, that is, the integration of human dynamics in ecological networks. I will very briefly present examples of our ongoing work using food-web models for studying coupled natural-human systems in fisheries.
Those unable to attend can stream the lecture from Twitter and our YouTube page.