William Fagan
Professor/Department Chair
Contact
Email: bfagan@umd.edu
Office Phone: 301.405.4672
Lab: 301.405.4512
Fax: 301.314.9358
Office Address: 1200-A Bio-Psych
3235 Bio-Psych
URL: http://www.clfs.umd.edu/biology/faganlab/
Teaching
HONR 238N Honors Interdisciplinary Seminar: Extinction Risk: Where Biology, Geography, and Mathematics Meet
BIOL 708T Theoretical Ecology
BIOL 708U Practicum in Data Analysis
Graduate Program Affiliations
Research Interests
My research involves meshing field biology with theoretical models to address critical questions in community ecology and conservation biology. I believe that ecological theory will be strengthened if it is forced to help solve real-world problems, and that conservation biology involves difficult choices that demand quantitative approaches. My ongoing research falls in several areas that illustrate this melding of theory and problem-solving, including 1) spatial ecological dynamics, 2) ecoinformatics, biodiversity databases, and conservation planning, and 3) biological stoichiometry and paleoecostoichioproteomics.
Current Research
Please see my lab website (http://www.clfs.umd.edu/biology/faganlab/) for information on current projects.
Recent Publications
Awards
Education
Ph.D., University of Washington, 1996. Conservation Biology, Community Ecology, Theoretical Ecology.
Contact
Email: bfagan@umd.edu
Office Phone: 301.405.4672
Lab: 301.405.4512
Fax: 301.314.9358
Office Address: 1200-A Bio-Psych
3235 Bio-Psych
URL: http://www.clfs.umd.edu/biology/faganlab/
Teaching
HONR 238N Honors Interdisciplinary Seminar: Extinction Risk: Where Biology, Geography, and Mathematics Meet
BIOL 708T Theoretical Ecology
BIOL 708U Practicum in Data Analysis
Graduate Program Affiliations
- Marine-Estuarine-Environmental Sciences (MEES)
- BISI - BISI-Computational Biology, Bioinformatics, & Genomics (CBBG)
- BISI - BISI-Behavior, Ecology, Evolution, & Systematics (BEES)
- Applied Mathematics & Statistics, and Scientific Computation (AMSC) Program
Research Interests
My research involves meshing field biology with theoretical models to address critical questions in community ecology and conservation biology. I believe that ecological theory will be strengthened if it is forced to help solve real-world problems, and that conservation biology involves difficult choices that demand quantitative approaches. My ongoing research falls in several areas that illustrate this melding of theory and problem-solving, including 1) spatial ecological dynamics, 2) ecoinformatics, biodiversity databases, and conservation planning, and 3) biological stoichiometry and paleoecostoichioproteomics.
Current Research
Please see my lab website (http://www.clfs.umd.edu/biology/faganlab/) for information on current projects.
Recent Publications
- Bewick, S., P. Staniczenko, B. Li, D. Karig, and W.F. Fagan. 2017. Invasion speeds in microbial systems with toxin production and quorum sensing. Journal of Theoretical Biology. 420: 290-303.
- Fagan, W. F., E. Gurarie, S. Bewick, A. Howard, S. Cantrell, and C. Cosner. 2017. Perceptual ranges, information gathering, and foraging success in dynamic landscapes. American Naturalist. 189: 474-489.
- Zhou, J., and W.F. Fagan. 2017. A discrete time model for populations in habitats with time-varying sizes. Journal of Mathematical Biology. 1-56.
- Bewick, S., R.S. Cantrell, C. Cosner, and W.F. Fagan. 2016. How resource phenology affects consumer population dynamics. American Naturalist, 187: 151-166.
- Foss-Grant, A. P., E. F. Zipkin, J.T. Thorson, O. P. Jensen, and W.F. Fagan. 2016. Hierarchical analysis of phylogenetic variation in intraspecific competition across fish species. Ecology, 97:1724-1734.
- Teitelbaum, C., S. Converse, W.F. Fagan, K. Boehning-Gaese, R. O’Hara, A. Lacey, and T. Mueller. 2016. Experience drives innovation of new migration patterns of whooping cranes in response to global change. Nature Communications. 7:12793 DOI: 10.1038/ncomms12793
- Teitelbaum, C., W.F. Fagan, C.H. Fleming, G. Dressler, J.M. Calabrese, P. Leimgruber, and T. Mueller. 2015. How far to go? Determinants of migration distance of land mammals. Ecology Letters. 18: 545-552. (Cover Article)
- Fleming, C.H., J.M. Calabrese, T. Mueller, K.A. Olson, P. Leimgruber, and W.F. Fagan. 2014. From fine-scale foraging to home ranges: A semi-variance approach to identifying movement modes across spatiotemporal scales. American Naturalist. E154-E167.
- Mueller, T., R. O'Hara, R. Urbanek, S. Converse, and W. F. Fagan. 2013. Social learning and migratory performance. Science. doi/10.1126/science.1237139. (Cover Article)
- Fagan, W.F., M. A. Lewis, M. Auger-Méthé, T. Avgar, S. Benhamou, G. Breed, L. LaDage, U. Schlägel, W. Tang, Y. Papastamatiou, J. Forester, and T. Mueller. 2013. Spatial memory and animal movement. Ecology Letters. DOI: 10.1111/ele.12165
- Fagan, W.F., Y. Pearson, E. Larsen, J.B. Turner, H.J. Lynch, H.Staver, J. Turner, A. E. Noble, S. Bewick, and E. Goldberg. 2013. Phylogenetic prediction of the maximum per capita rate of population growth. Proceedings of the Royal Society, Series B. 280: 20130523
- Lynch, H.J., R. Naveen, P.N. Trathan, W.F. Fagan. 2012. Spatially integrated assessment reveals widespread changes in penguin populations on the Antarctic Peninsula. Ecology 93:1367-1377.
Awards
- Fellow (Elected), Ecological Society of America, 2013.
- Fellow (Elected), American Association for the Advancement of Science, 2012.
- University of Maryland Center for Teaching Excellence (CTE) Distinguished Scholar-Teacher Award, 2010.
- University of Maryland College of Chemical and Life Sciences Research Award, 2009.
- Presidential Award, The American Society of Naturalists, for best paper in American Naturalist in 2005 for: Fagan, W.F., M.A. Lewis, M. Neubert, C. Aumann, J. Apple, and J.G. Bishop. 2005. When can herbivores reverse the spread of an invading plant? A test case from Mount St. Helens. American Naturalist. 166: 669-686.
- Guggenheim Fellow, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, 2001-2002.
Education
Ph.D., University of Washington, 1996. Conservation Biology, Community Ecology, Theoretical Ecology.