Principal Investigator: Nicholas Kortessis
Email: [email protected] Office: 004 Winston Hall Office Phone: +1 (336) 758-3013 Twitter: @NKortessis Nick is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biology at Wake Forest University interested in understanding the processes that generate and maintain biological diversity. The major theme of Nick's research is the role that environmental variability--both in space and time--plays in species persistence. More than persistence, he is interested in coexistence, which is persistence of multiple species once considering their interactions with each other. Nick uses mathematics to explore these interests, and builds models--informed by real species--to run experiments not possible in nature. Species persistence operates at large spatial and temporal scales, and it is often infeasible to conduct experiments at such large scales. But one can using models, which help to find critical processes in nature that reveal the drivers of species coexistence. More recently, Nick has begun developing statistical measures and approaches to help glean these processes from noisy data. |
Nick received a Ph.D. in the department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology working with Dr. Peter Chesson at the University of Arizona where he studied the evolutionary stability of species coexistence mechanisms in fluctuating environments, particularly the storage effect.
Nick also received a master's degree at Florida State University working with Dr. Charlotte Lee on how consumers foraging responses to multiple resources compete and coexist with one another.
For more information on my current and past interests, see the research page.
Nick also received a master's degree at Florida State University working with Dr. Charlotte Lee on how consumers foraging responses to multiple resources compete and coexist with one another.
For more information on my current and past interests, see the research page.
Graduate Students:
Michael DeWitt (PhD student) Michael is interested in the factors that influence the establishment and spread of novel infectious diseases. Michael is working on these ideas as well as quantifying the impact of asynchrony of non-pharmaceutical interventions on the rate of covid-19 spread in the US early in the pandemic. Isaac Sowah Badu (MS student) Isaac is interested in habitat fragmentation and connectivity. Isaac is researching how the lands between habitat fragments influences diversity within remaining habitat patches. In particular, he is asking about how coexistence mechanisms at different scales are altered by habitat fragmentation. Isaac is passionate about understanding these ideas and their implications for wildlife conservation and natural resource management. If you are interested in joining the lab's research, I encourage you to contact [email protected] and ask about opportunities. I am accepting applications for graduate students (both MS and PhD students) this fall. Interested students should include a statement of their research interests and how that intersects with research done in the lab. Undergraduate Students:
Liam Anderson (WFU Bio Major, Stats Minor, Fall 2022). Jiangxue (Shirly) Wu (WFU Bio Major, Spring 2023). Sascha Cooney (WFU Bio Major, Fall 2023) Grace Tomlinson (WFU Bio Major, Summer-Fall 2023) Helena Herazlak (WFU Bio Major, Fall 2023) Mari Dragan (WFU Bio Major, Fall 2023) Garrett Mcgraw (WFU Env Stud Major, Fall 2023) Karen Wang (WFU Bio and Econ Major, Fall 2023) Arnav Sharma (WFU Bio) Undergraduate's interested in these ideas should reach out to Dr. Kortessis to discuss research opportunities. Postdocs:
I am always happy to work together with interested and bright scientist to help cultivate a postdoctoral fellowship application. There are great opportunities, for example the NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology (typically due in the fall and the NSF Mathematical Sciences Postdoctoral Fellowship (typically due in the fall).
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