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Alison Boyer

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Research Interests

I use methods from ecological informatics and data from the fossil record to pursue questions in community ecology, extinction risk, and processes governing biological diversity. My research is motivated by a desire to understand and prevent human-caused losses of biodiversity. Research areas include:

  1. Paleoecological study of Holocene extinctions of Pacific island birds, with field work on the island of New Caledonia.
  2. Examining changes in the structure of vertebrate communities due to human environmental impacts.
  3. Developing accurate models of extinction risk for global vertebrates.
  4. Understanding the forces shaping the evolution of body size in vertebrates, including the 'island rule' and macroevolutionary - macroecological patterns.

Education

  • 2008 - Ph.D., Univ. New Mexico (Biology)

Selected Publications

  • Smith, F.A., Boyer, A.G., et al. (20 authors). 2010. The Evolution of Maximum Body Size of Terrestrial Mammals. Science. 330: 1216-1219.
  • Boyer, A.G., James, H.F., Olson, S.L. and Grant-Mackie, J.A. 2010. Long-term ecological change in a conservation hotspot: The fossil avifauna of Mé Auré Cave, New Caledonia. Biodiversity and Conservation. 19:3207-3224.
  • Boyer, A.G. and W. Jetz. 2010. Biogeography of body size in Pacific island birds. Ecography. 33: 369-379.
  • Boyer, A.G. 2010. Consistent Ecological Selectivity Through Time in Pacific Island Avian Extinctions. Conservation Biology. 24: 511-519.
  • Boyer, A.G., J.L.E. Cartron and J.H. Brown. 2010. Interspecific pairwise relationships among body length, clutch size, and latitude: anatomy of a macroecological paradox in birds. Journal of Biogeography. 37:47-56.
  • Davidson, A.D., Hamilton, M.J., Boyer, A.G., Ceballos, G. and Brown, J.H. 2009. The Ecological Structure of Extinction Risk in Mammals. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. 106:10702-10705.
  • McClain, C.R. and Boyer A.G. 2009. Biodiversity and Body Size Are Linked Across Metazoans. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B, Biological Sciences. 276:2209-2215.
  • Payne, J., Boyer, A.G., et al. (13 authors). 2009. Two-phase increase in the maximum size of life over 3.5 billion years reflects biological innovation and environmental opportunity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. 106:24-27.
  • Boyer, A.G. 2008. Extinction Patterns in the Avifauna of the Hawaiian Islands. Diversity and Distributions. 14: 509-517.
  • McClain, C.R., A.G. Boyer, and G. Rosenberg. 2006. The Island Rule and the Evolution of Body Size in the Deep Sea. Journal of Biogeography. 33:1578-1584.
Alison Boyer

Contact Information

Alison Boyer
Research Assistant Professor
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
University of Tennessee
491 Dabney Hall
Knoxville, TN 37996-1610

Phone: (865) 974-2913
Fax: (865) 974-3067
Email: alison.boyer@utk.edu