Our mission is to provide the evidence-base to underpin the protection and management of biodiversity for its inherent value and for the benefit of society.

The research group comprises expertise in a wide range of ecological disciplines (e.g. population and community ecology, spatial and landscape ecology) and taxonomic specialisations (e.g. lower and higher plants, invertebrates, birds and mammals), reflecting the complexity and cross cutting nature of modern ecology.

Particular strengths of the group include:

Population ecology where we investigate how producer-consumer interactions – including herbivory, predation and parasitism - influence the dynamics of key species of animals and plants and how these interactions cascade through ecosystems to impact on biodiversity.

Community ecology where we assess the links between diversity, function and the services provided by ecosystems and investigate how the key drivers of environmental change – climate change, diffuse pollution, land management and government policies – shape biodiversity change, and in turn, how these can best be mitigated

We also work closely with the other groups in the Institute, for example with the Catchment Management Group in aquatic systems and with the Soils Group on linkages between above and below ground ecological processes.

Ecological management is increasingly influenced by the ways in which stakeholder’s such as farmers and other land managers value and influence biodiversity and we therefore collaborate with our Social and Economic Research Group and Integrated Land Use Systems Group to incorporate the human dimensions.

Whilst our research programme is primarily based in Scotland, the expertise and experience within the group is highly relevant to biodiversity conservation and sustainable development across the globe. As a result we are increasingly involved in international research.

Further information

The Ecology science area has a number of research projects.

Ecology staff list