News

Graduate Student Opportunities in the McClain Lab

Ph.D. Student to research the Macroecology of Body Size Are you a dedicated and innovative researcher looking to contribute to a groundbreaking project that will reshape our understanding of marine ecosystems? I am seeking a motivated graduate student to join a collaborative team focused on the study of body size variations in marine organisms and their impact on biodiversity. Body size is a fundamental parameter that influences various aspects of an organism’s life, including resource Read more…

By Craig McClain, ago

Isolating the drivers of the species-area relationship in experimental habitat islands

Recently defended master’s student, Granger Hank, published his first, first author publication.  Very proud and excited to see this work in print. Hanks, Granger W., Natalie A. Clay, Maggie Herrmann, Clifton Nunnally, S. River D. Bryant, and Craig R. McClain. 2023 “Isolating the drivers of the species‐area relationship in experimental habitat islands.” Journal of Biogeography.  

By Craig McClain, ago

Disentangling mechanisms of species–energy relationships in experimental deep-sea wood falls

Another new paper out from the McClain Lab! McClain, C. R., Bryant, S. R. D., Hanks, G., & Byrnes, J. (2023). Disentangling mechanisms of species–energy relationships in experimental deep‐sea wood falls. Ecosphere, 14(10), e4667. A multitude of hypotheses have been invoked to explain increases in richness with increases in energy availability. Experiments have the potential to reveal causality, and species–energy experiments have yielded substantial insights into energetic community assembly. Here, we examine six mechanisms underlying species–energy relationships Read more…

By Craig McClain, ago

Researcher’s study sheds light on marine biodiversity, ecological links between land and sea

The University of Louisiana at Lafayette released this statement about our new paper out in Ecology.   McClain, C. R., Boolukos, C. M., Bryant, S. R. D., & Hanks, G. (2023). Sunken trees in the deep sea link terrestrial and marine biodiversity. Ecology, e4168. A study led by a University of Louisiana at Lafayette scientist has yielded significant insight into the role sunken wood plays in marine biodiversity, and ecological links between land and deep-sea environments. Researchers determined Read more…

By Craig McClain, ago

Ph.D. Student River Bryant Has Amazing Publication Year

Soon to be Dr. Bryant had an amazing year with three first author publications bases on her Ph.D. thesis research! Bryant, S.R. and McClain, C.R. 2022. Functional space expansion driven by transitions between advantageous traits across a deep-sea energetic gradient. Proceedings of the Royal Society, B. 289:20221302 Bryant, S.R.. and McClain, C.R. 2022. Energetic constraints on body-size niches of deep-sea bivalves. Biology Letters. 18:20220112 Bryant, S.R. and McClain, C.R. 2022. The macrofaunal metropolis formed in Read more…

By Craig McClain, ago

The macrofaunal metropolis in the sediments around the first‐ever deep‐sea alligator fall

A new paper led by Ph.D. student, River Bryant! Bryant, S. R., Nunnally, C., Hanks, G. & McClain, C. R. (2022). The macrofaunal metropolis in the sediments around the first-ever deep-sea alligator fall. Marine Ecology, 43, e12707. https://doi.org/10.1111/maec.12707 The maintenance of high diversity in deep-sea sediments is often hypothesized to be a result of heterogeneity in disturbance and carbon availability creating long-lived patches of unique communities. Deep-sea food falls are known to contribute to this patchiness, influencing the beta-diversity of soft-bottom communities through varying Read more…

By Craig McClain, ago

New Paper: Look Mom, I am a Paleobiologist!

Another paper out of the lab from our continued collaborations with the Payne lab at Stanford. McClain, C. R., N. A. Heim, M. L. Knope, and J. L. Payne. 2018. Energy availability and the evolutionary paleoecology of the marine biosphere. Paleobiology online early. The quantity of biomass in an ecosystem is constrained by energy availability. It is less clear, however, how energy availability constrains taxonomic and functional diversity. Competing models suggest biodiversity is either resource-limited Read more…

By Craig McClain, ago

New Paper: Energetic tradeoffs control the size distribution of aquatic mammals

Gearty, W., J. L. Payne, and C. R. McClain. 2018. Energetic tradeoffs control the size distribution of aquatic mammals. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, U.S.A. online early. Very excited to have this new paper out with William Gearty and Jonathan Payne at Stanford University examining why marine animals are big and why they are not bigger. The reasons why aquatic mammals exhibit larger average sizes than their terrestrial relatives have long been debated. Read more…

By Craig McClain, ago

New Additions to the McClain Lab

With the recently funded NSF grant and finally settling into LUMCON, I recently added to my lab.  I am very excited to add Dr. Cliff Nunnally as a research associate.  Cliff has an impressive track record and particularly well-suited to research at hand.  Cliff received his Ph.D. from Texas A&M conducting research on the deep Gulf of Mexico with Gil Rowe.  Clif then spent time at the University of Hawaii working with both Jeff Drazen and Read more…

By Craig McClain, ago