This MedLibrary.org supplementary page on Theoretical ecology is provided directly from the open source Wikipedia as a service to our readers. Please see the note below on authorship of this content, as well as the Wikipedia usage guidelines. To search for other content from our encyclopedia supplement, please use the form below:
Related Sponsors
Theoretical ecology refers to several intellectual traditions. The tradition pursued in universities and scientific journals under the rubric of theoretical ecology addresses the equations and probability distributions that govern the demography and biogeography of species. Common topics of theoretical ecology include population dynamics and the mathematics of competition.
To a large extent theoretical ecology draws on the work of G. Evelyn Hutchinson and his students. Brothers H.T. Odum and E.P. Odum are seen as the true founders of modern theoretical ecology (sometimes described as ecosystem ecology). Robert MacArthur brought theory to community ecology. Daniel Simberloff was the student of E.O. Wilson, with whom MacArthur collaborated on The Theory of Island Biogeography, a seminal work in the development of theoretical ecology. Simberloff went on to add rigour to experimental ecology and was one of the stalwarts in the SLOSS Debate (whether it is preferable to protect a Single Large or Several Small reserves) and forced supporters of Jared Diamond's community assembly rules to defend their ideas through Neutral Model Analysis. Simberloff also played a key role in the (ongoing) debate on the utility of corridors for connecting isolated reserves (with Reed Noss taking the lead on the opposing side).
MacArthur's students Stephen Hubbell and Michael Rosenzweig combined theoretical and practical elements into works that extended MacArthur and Wilson's Island Biogeography Theory - Hubbell with his Unified Neutral Theory of Biodiversity and Biogeography and Rosenzweig with is Species Diversity in Space and Time.
Other key theoretical ecologists include Robert May, who has been described as being "one of the best minds in ecology", Robert Rosen, author of "Life Itself", G. David Tilman, and Robert Ulanowicz, author of Ecology: The Ascendant Perspective.
See also
Wikipedia content modification information:
- This page was last modified on 31 December 2007, at 18:03.
Wikipedia Authorship and Review
Wikipedia content provided here is not reviewed directly by MedLibrary.org. Wikipedia content is authored by an open community of volunteers and is not produced by or in any way affiliated with MedLibrary.org.
Wikipedia Usage Guidelines
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article on "Theoretical ecology".
The URL for this specific entry is:
All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. (See Copyrights for details). Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.