People

Current members

PI: Rachel Germain cv
Assistant Professor

PhD University of Toronto
BSc University of Guelph

SSE profile

Jawad Sakarchi (MSc student)

Jawad started his MSc in May 2019. His interests are in exploring impacts of evolutionary history on spatial coexistence and how coexistence mechanisms can be routes to evolutionary rescue.

Mia Tayler Waters, M.A. (PhD Student)

Mia joined the lab as a PhD student in September 2019. She is interested in understanding how coevolution and coexistence of species across trophic levels and dynamic landscapes influence the structure of biodiversity.

Jessica Kowalski (MSc student)

Jessica began her MSc in September 2020. She is interested in understanding the spatial and temporal mechanisms that support species coexistence and how these mechanisms (or the break down of these mechanisms) interact to influence biodiversity and the processes of community assembly and disassembly.

William (Jia-Ang) Ou (PhD student)

Will joined the lab as a PhD student in January 2021. He is broadly interested in diversity and the evolution of complexity. In particular, he is interested in exploring how feedbacks between ecology and evolution can create opportunities for species coexistence.

Tahlia Read (directed studies)

Tahlia joined the lab as a work-learn student in May 2021 and is continuing as a work-learn student for the upcoming school year. She is currently working on a directed study investigating how dispersal between different quality habitats affects interspecific competition outcomes.

Graydon Gillies (honour's thesis)

Graydon joined the lab in September 2021 as an undergraduate Honours Thesis student. He is working with Jess on a research project that is examining how variability in the timing of drought influences demographic stochasticity in the California grass species Bromus hordeaceus.

Tess Grainger (Biodiversity & Banting postdoc)

Tess joined the lab in 2021. She's interested in how temperature affects eco-evolutionary dynamics.
website

Melanie Tan (undergraduate lab technician)

Melanie joined the lab in May 2021 on a UBC SURE fellowship and is now working as a work-learn student for the 2021/2022 school year. She is currently working with Tess on studying evolutionary rescue in Tribolium castaneum (i.e., flour beetles).

Alumni

Megan Szojka (MSc Student)

Megan joined the lab in 2018. Her thesis explored the relationship between biodiversity and dispersal through a combination of greenhouse and field experiments. Her work aims to improve our understanding of how competition, abiotic sorting, and dispersal interact across scales in real landscapes. Current position: PhD in Shoemaker Lab

Chelsea Little, PhD (Killam Postdoctoral Fellow)
personal website

Chelsea's research focuses on meta-ecosystems: the movement of organisms, matter, and information, and how this affects local ecosystem dynamics. Her background is as a community ecologist to explore the consequences of community assembly and composition on ecosystem processes and functioning.
Current position: Assistant Professor at Simon Fraser University

Aishwarya Subramanian (directed studies)

Aishwarya joined the lab as a Directed Studies student in January 2021. She is interested in understanding how animal movement influences connectivity of plant communities within a landscape, and how movement is rewired by wildfire.

Savanna Skinner (UBC Summer Undergraduate Research Assistant)

Savanna joined the lab to work with us in California, but due to covid, she has quickly pivotted to local experiments testing hypotheses associated with ant/aphid mutualisms, with a population ecology twist.

Kelley Slimon (directed studies student)

Kelley joined the lab in 2018 as a work learn student before staying on for a directed studies project. She tested the evolution of dispersal, dormancy, and their covariance along environmental gradients. In doing so, she clarified the ecological value of each trait, and found that dispersal and dormancy are not simply alternate forms of bet hedging.
Current position: PhD with Agrawal lab at Cornell

Kately Nikiforuk & Jenny Mackay (summer researchers)

Kately and Jenny are working together to test how animals link plant populations in space, dispersing seed and redistributing energy and nutrients. They are collecting animal poops, germinating the seeds they contain, and then incinerating 🔥 them.

Mackenzie Urquhart-Cronish (Research Assistant) cv

Mackenzie has been working in the lab since the summer of 2017, and is currently a collaborator on a project disentangling local adaptation to the biotic vs. abiotic environment.
Current position: PhD in Angert Lab

Research technicians: Genevieve Ke (2019), Dennis Chiu (2018)

Join the lab!

I joined the Department of Zoology and the Biodiversity Research Centre at the University of British Columbia as an Assistant Professor in January 2019.

Grad students: I seek curious, motivated students with some prior research experience (e.g., work learn experience, undergraduate research). Though my primary study system is Californian annual plants, I am happy to support students interested in exploring local field sites, non-plant systems, or data synthesis projects.

Postdocs: Please email me to discuss research interests and potential projects. UBC has a number of fellowship opportunities, including Killam (due Oct.), Banting (due Sept.), and the Biodiversity Postdoc (due Jan.). I am happy to provide feedback on application materials.

Undergrads: There are many opportunities to gain research experience through the work learn program, independent research courses, or NSERC-funded summer research opportunities. We are unable to support unpaid volunteer positions in our lab.

Diversity 🌈 & inclusion: Science is ultimately a creative endeavor, and benefits from a diversity of brains and backgrounds. Members of under-represented groups are especially encouraged to apply.

To apply to the lab, please email your CV, a summary of your research interests, and a brief statement of your career goals to rgermain[at]zoology.ubc.ca. ***our openings for grad student recruitment is Sept. 2021

McLaughlin Natural Reserve, California

Greenhouse facilities near UBC Farm

Vancouver, BC