Joe Brennan
Community ecology & theoretical population biology 🪴🧬 🧮
Ecological, evolutionary, and environmental mechanisms of coexistence 🤝, community assembly ⬆️ , and community disassembly ⬇️
UC Davis Population Biology PhD Candidate 🐄
biologyjoe87.github.io
- Reposted by Joe BrennanJust a reminder that we have a new newsletter (and there's some fun stuff coming out tomorrow)! #PrideinSTEM 🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️📧 You can sign up here: prideinstem.org/newsletter
- Reposted by Joe BrennanHappy to share that this paper has just been published in Ecology Letters! We hope that our framework can be useful for theoreticians and empiricists working on different systems. Let me know if you hit a paywall and would like a pdf. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
- First time field trip to Oakland zoo 🥳 @reginafairbanks.bsky.social
- Reposted by Joe BrennanPsyched to share a new paper out today in @pnas.org! W/ @zachgold.bsky.social, Haylee Oyler, Jonathan Levine and @nathanjbkraft.bsky.social, we showed that spatial clustering modifies the strength of competition in a diverse annual plant community. Check it out here: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
- Reposted by Joe BrennanPhotos of Atlantic puffins by Neil Dawe (taken on an island just off the west coast of the UK): whyevolutionistrue.com/2026/01/11/r...
- Reposted by Joe BrennanCome learn with us! #REU!
- Reposted by Joe BrennanLooking forward to the Modern Coexistence Theory workshop tomorrow. Please repost :)
- Join us for an @smtpb.bsky.social workshop on Modern Coexistence Theory. We'll cover mathematical foundations, the theory of partitioning, and data-based applications. Featuring @swatipatel.bsky.social, Nick Kortessis, & Lauren Shoemaker. Zoom link here: smtpb.org/event-6426026
- Being a theoretician means listening to an obscene amount of music
- Reposted by Joe BrennanClimate change postdoctoral fellowship (JRF, 3Y) opportunity at Oxford! 🌍 Brilliant opportunity for anybody with <2 years postdoc experience by October 2026. Would be great to get coral people - there's a strong cluster of coral reef/climate change people here. 🪸 www.queens.ox.ac.uk/vacancies/ju...
- Reposted by Joe BrennanPhD-position vacancy in Jan Hrcek's lab lab.hrcek.net, Czech Academy of Sciences: Exploring how rapid evolution in communities allows maintenance of genetic variation and species diversity. @erc.europa.eu 🪰 🧬 🌏 🧪Application deadline: January 7th 2026
- Reposted by Joe BrennanTreating emergent traits of the microbiome like quantitative genetic traits of the host reveals how environmentally acquired symbionts can contribute to hosts' adaptation
- Excited to announce a new preprint out now. Myself and Laurie Balstad led a group of predominantly early career theoreticians (along with Marissa Baskett and Mikaela Provost) to compile a set of guiding principles for data-model integration in theoretical ecology.
- Our rules are broken up into 3 pillars: iteration in the data model integration process, using multiples sources of data, and understanding and embracing uncertainty. We had a lot of fun crafting and refining the ten rules and hope it’ll be of use to those new to the data-model integration process.
- Reposted by Joe BrennanThese weasels have locally adapted their winter coats to varying snow cover thanks to a million-year-old mutation 🌿 buff.ly/TnOfYWt
- Reposted by Joe BrennanJoin us for an @smtpb.bsky.social workshop on Modern Coexistence Theory. We'll cover mathematical foundations, the theory of partitioning, and data-based applications. Featuring @swatipatel.bsky.social, Nick Kortessis, & Lauren Shoemaker. Zoom link here: smtpb.org/event-6426026
- Reposted by Joe BrennanPriority effects drive fungal and nematode emergence from insect larvae biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/202…
- Reposted by Joe BrennanLike math and plant community ecology? I am recruiting one or two new Ph.D. students to work on theory and its integration with data in the areas of forest dynamics, species coexistence, or plant community ecology more generally. Deadlines for the EEB and Plant Biology programs are Dec. 1.
- @gcbias.bsky.social have you seen them yet?
- Leave it to TEs to mediate a trait with whimsy ✨✨✨
- I am so excited to share new work on a TE insertion that regulates iridescence in swordtails, led by fantastic grad student @nadiahaghani.bsky.social and with help from many coauthors! In a time that has been so difficult to navigate, this & other projects have kept my spirits up: shorturl.at/NE65A
- Reposted by Joe BrennanAcademics in Assyria in the 7th c BC complain that admin is preventing them from doing research and teaching
- Another year without any progress on this important topic. What is the deal with Neanderthal lice? Where & who are they & how many & did we share lice with them & did they share lice with us & was there lice hybridization with human-neanderthal hybridization? Plz help. @reginafairbanks.bsky.social
- Reposted by Joe Brennanremembering my most epic wildlife photo ever. this was not staged, we came across this on a trail. just bananas.
- Reposted by Joe Brennan📣Our line-up for our next theoretical ecology series (crossing three continents!), It will have been 5 years since we started, and still all our seminars are fully open on Zoom (iite.info/seminar/). There is no need to register, but you can sign up to email updates here iite.info/seminar-emai...
- Reposted by Joe BrennanI made a flyer! Know anyone in CA, OR, WA, or BC who might be interested in collecting mushrooms for research purposes? #mycology #citizenscience Please share widely! 🧪 🍄🟫 🌲 A PDF version can be found here: drive.proton.me/urls/W1MM4FG...
- Excited to share a new pre-print in collaboration with @sebastianschreiber.bsky.social, "Using Modern Coexistence Theory to understand community disassembly"! We set out to understand how techniques used to study coexistence can be extended to understand community disassembly. (1/X)
- Coexistence outcomes often depend on the complex interplay of species interactions. Consequently in some cases, the extinction of one species can trigger the loss of another, a process known as secondary extinction, as explained by a plaque I came across at the Bronx Zoo. (2/X)
- We apply recently-developed techniques from dynamical systems theory and modern coexistence theory to identify (1) WHEN and WHY secondary extinctions occur. We demonstrate that invasion growth rates (per capita growth rates of species when rare) can achieve these goals! (3/X)
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View full threadExcited to hear folks' thoughts! It is a project I have been really excited about and am glad to get out into the world. Please reach out with any questions, ideas, or feedback :D . (9/9)
- Reposted by Joe Brennan[This post could not be retrieved]
- "Every dollar spent resurrecting the past is a dollar not spent to protect the present"
- Reposted by Joe BrennanSanaa Khan from @katelaskowski.bsky.social lab talks about when males of Atlantic mollies transfer their sperm to sperm parasites Amazon mollies. An amazing talk with incredibly cool results! #Behaviour2025 @behaviour2025.bsky.social
- Reposted by Joe BrennanExcited to share our new preprint for the tskit_arg_visualizer Python package! ARGs can sometimes feel like a black box, so @yanwong.bsky.social and I have been developing a method to programmatically drawing these graphs. 🔗 arxiv.org/abs/2508.03958 1/6
- Excited to be at the ESA Annual Meeting! I am presenting Tuesday morning on understanding processes of community disassembly and secondary extinctions using modern coexistence theory. Also would love to chat with folks at the conference so feel free to message if you’d like to chat!
- COS 035 - COS - Modeling: Communities, Disturbance, Succession 2 Tue, Aug 12 8:00 – 9:30 AM EDT BCC 344
- Reposted by Joe BrennanJoin us in the evolution tri-societies Week of Action for NSF! Call/write congress, engage with colleagues, friends and family about the importance of NSF funding! Scan the QR code on the attached image for instructions and scripts. We must make noise! Pls RT!!!! #WithoutNSF #SaveNSF #SupportNSF
- Reposted by Joe Brennan#MarineEcology #PhDOpportunity #ecologicalnetworks www.biodiversitydatascience.com Biodiversity Data Science. We use machine learning and artificial intelligence tools to aid biodiversity conservation and management, in support of the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
- Reposted by Joe BrennanIt wasnt easy for #phylosymbiosis to get off the ground, but it is now. Here is the first study to suggest that phytoplankton have phylosymbiotic microbiomes. On a personal note, it’s fulfilling to watch the term, the concepts, and approaches broadly take flight. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
- Reposted by Joe BrennanNew preprint! Where we construct a model to explore how body size and predator-prey interactions determine macroevolutionary constraints on mammalian size and diet throughout the Cenozoic… arxiv.org/abs/2410.18849
- Reposted by Joe BrennanWell that's one way to get the best seed for breeding giant sweet corn! This early 20th century seed catalog advertised a $50 prize for the largest ear grown that season. And if you don't win the prize, at least this variety will "excite the admiration of your friends". #SeedsOfHistory
- Spotted in the UC Davis arboretum. Unsure what it is. Maybe a northern shrike? @phylogenomics.bsky.social
