Jennifer A. Lau Associate Professor

Research areas:

• Ecology
• Evolution

Our work combines community ecology with evolutionary ecology—often capitalizing on long-term experiments—to study how human-caused global changes influence the ecology and evolution of plants and the insects and microbes with which they interact. Recent projects focus on: 1) the potential for rapid evolution and interactions with microorganisms to mitigate (or sometimes exacerbate) the effects of global change on plants, 2) the repeatability of evolutionary change in plant-microbe mutualisms, 3) the influence of genetic variation on prairie restorations, and 4) the effects of global warming on biological invasions.

e study how plant populations respond to human-caused environmental change, the ecology and evolution of species interactions, and natural selection in the wild.

Research:

• Resilience to drought? Or a drought of resilience?
• Mechanisms of Resilience to Drought
• Effects of global warming on invasive vs. native species
• The evolution of legume-rhizobia mutualisms
• The long-term consequences of genetic variation

Research: Ecology & Evolution; Human-caused global change; Ecology and evolution of plants, insects, and microbes; Plant-microbe mutualisms; Genetic variation; Prairie restorations

Research Area:

• Human Environment Interaction and Sustainability
• Environmental Science