Areas of expertise
Teaching
I teach a variety of courses from the BSc to postgraduate level. Topics range from multivariate statistics and use of GIS and remote sensing to basic ecology, biogeography, tropical ecology and human evolution.
Research
I am broadly interested in ecology, evolution and biogeography, especially in and around the rain forests of Amazonia. I am currently leading the Amazon Research Team, which is a group of researchers with a wide variety of interests. Our aims include (but are not limited to) clarifying species-environment relationships, drivers of variation in species composition, broad-scale compositional patterns and the evolutionary origin of Amazonian biodiversity. We are using indicator plant groups and remotely sensed data (satellite and radar images) as indicators of general floristic and edaphic patterns, and also work on taxonomy, evolutionary history and biogeography. My pet group is ferns, but we also work on Melastomataceae plants and Ichneumonidae wasps. My theoretical interests relate to diversity (especially beta diversity and the numerous concepts associated with it) and the analytical methods available to address questions related to species diversity and turnover.