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 Read more…
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 Read more…
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 Read more…
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 Read more…
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 Read more…
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 Read more…
So in the roller coaster that is 2016, I am very happy to announce that I have a NSF funded grant. Seth Newsome (U. of New Mexico) and I are continuing my work with deep-sea wood falls. The official title is “The energetic assembly of biological communities: a test with Read more…
Very excited to see the third paper from the multi-year, wood-fall research project now in press. The paper focuses on a well-known macroecological pattern, the abundance-occupancy relationship. Simply, we find that species that are on average more abundant at any given location or more likely to be found at more Read more…
I along with my former Ph.D. advisor, Michael Rex, have recently published a comprehensive review of species turnover and diversity in the deep-sea benthos. We review patterns and causes of β-diversity in the deep-sea benthos at different spatial scales and for different body sizes. Changes in species composition occurring with depth are Read more…
The second paper from the wood-fall experiments is now in press! You can read my public outreach post on the paper and the major finding at Deep-Sea News. McClain, C., Barry, J., Eernisse, D., Horton, T., Judge, J., Kakui, K., Mah, C., & Warén, A. (2015). Multiple Processes Generate Productivity-Diversity Read more…