The Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Michigan presents an exciting international symposium on the integration of evolutionary and ecological perspectives to understand community assembly. The 12th annual Early Career Scientists Symposium will be held on Saturday, March 12, 2016 in the Chemistry Building, 930 University Avenue, Ann Arbor, Michigan. This year’s theme is Frontiers in Community Assembly.

Our outstanding speaker lineup of keynote and emerging leaders will present a diverse array of integrative advances in our understanding of community assembly. These topics include new conceptualizations of the species pool for community ecology, the genomic processes underlying species coexistence, phylogenetic models of community composition, insights from paleo-communities, coevolutionary networks, and macroevolutionary dynamics of assembly.

The keynote speakers are Rosemary Gillespie, professor and Schlinger Chair in Systematic Entomology, Department of Environmental Science and Essig Museum of Entomology, University of California, Berkeley, and Tadashi Fukami, associate professor, Department of Biology, Stanford University. You can read more about them and our early career speakers and their presentations under the speakers tab on this website. Early career scientists are considered senior graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, and first- or second-year faculty.

Graduate students from all universities and all disciplines are invited to present their work during a lunchtime poster session, and can indicate so when they register. Registration will be open soon.

University of Michigan EEB students are particularly encouraged to show their own work and seek feedback from the scholars in attendance. Poster specifications are on the ECSS website. Lunch will be provided at the poster session and a dinner reception will follow the symposium.

Registration is now open. It is complimentary and open to the public.

For more information, contact Carol Solomon.

The 2016 Early Career Scientists Symposium scientific committee includes:
Lydia Beaudrot
James Pease
Marian Schmidt
Carol Solomon
Ben Winger
Senay Yitbarek