News & Stories

WHRO interviews LEC director, Jonathan Losos, about his new book, The Cat’s Meow.

With its host of top-rated attractions and miles of bike paths and running trails, Forest Park has enticed generations of WashU community members to step outside the university’s campuses and explore. Today, students and faculty are venturing deeper into the woods to learn about the biodiversity that teems there and to highlight the connectedness between the natural and the human.

In a world without humans, many dogs could survive due to their wolf ancestry and adaptability, but cats may face greater challenges from predation and competition. While cats are independent, their survival would depend on factors like outdoor access and the threat posed by larger predators, including dogs.

Matthew Austin, an ecologist and biodiversity postdoctoral fellow with the Living Earth Collaborative at Washington University in St. Louis, published a study in the American Journal of Botany that describes changes to the flowering time and other important life cycle events in Leavenworthia species, a group of small flowering plants found in glades in Missouri.

Officials in Argentina are building a statue to recognize the work of Train, a rescue dog who contributed to significant conservation research by a WashU scientist.

LEC post-doc Matt Austin leads research team to examine the role of climate change to discover warmer and drier springs is a major contributor to Leavenworthia blooming earlier.

New research published in Regional Environmental Change, funded in part by a Living Earth Collaborative seed grant, reveals that climate zone shifts in Kenya between 1980 and 2020 are leading to hotter and drier conditions, threatening ecological diversity and food security. The study found that tropical climate zones expanded, while arid regions grew by over 50,000 square kilometers. This shift, driven by rising temperatures and altered precipitation patterns, significantly impacts agriculture, particularly in regions dependent on rain-fed farming. The findings highlight the urgent need for adaptation strategies to mitigate the effects of climate change on ecosystems and livelihoods in Kenya and similar regions.

Research published in Regional Environmental Change has shown that as climate zones shift toward hotter and drier conditions, ecological diversity will decline, posing a major threat to terrestrial ecosystems with far-reaching social and ecological impacts, This work was supported in part by the Taylor Geospatial Institute and a seed research grant from the Living Earth Collaborative at Washington University in St. Louis.

Forest Park Living Lab is collaborative of six different partners: the Saint Louis Zoo, Washington University, St. Louis University, Forest Park Forever, the World Bird Sanctuary and the National Great Rivers Research and Education Center, where researchers from around the St. Louis area are tracking animals and trying to learn more about them and how they’re adapting to the urban area around the park.

The Earth is facing two interconnected crises — loss of biodiversity and climate change. Each separately is an enormous threat to life on this planet. However, together they are fueling each other, creating a worsening downward spiral.

Research from Washington University in St. Louis calls for a reappraisal of the process of plant domestication, based on almost a decade of observations and experiments.

A new documentary film, “Mussel Grubbing: A Citizen Science Treasure Hunt,” about a freshwater mussel biodiversity project supported by the Living Earth Collaborative at Washington University in St. Louis, kicked off the inaugural World Water Film Festival March 19 in New York, and it won “Best Documentary Film” at the festival.

From exploring the beach and San Diego Zoo as a kid to studying kissing bugs in Panama as a PhD candidate, Kaylee Arnold’s path in biology has been a long and winding one. Most recently, it has brought her to St. Louis, where she is joining Washington University’s Living Earth Collaborative as a postdoctoral research associate.

This month, the Republic of Congo agreed to protect a 36-square-mile area called Djéké Triangle by making it part of the adjacent Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park. Biodiversity research led by St. Louis scientists helped inform the decision to include the Djéké Triangle in the existing national park.

Learn about the Forest Park Living Lab project that started with LEC Seed grant monies. Experts in wildlife ecology, animal movement and veterinary medicine joined forces in a landmark collaboration to enhance how we understand Forest Park.

Researchers discover elephant extinction could have major impact on atmospheric carbon levels.

On November 12, 2022,Webster University held the Shutterbee Symposium. The symposium featured 12 presentations on topics ranging from the American Goldfinch to native gardening, highlighting the project’s success in documenting nearly 39,000 individual bees in the region since its inception in 2020.

A new book by WashU biology professor, Joan E. Strassmann, borrows from the slow food movement to propose a more thoughtful, less competitive form of bird-watching.

The “páramo biodiversity farms” initiative in Colombia’s Sumapaz region represents an innovative approach to biodiversity conservation, emphasizing the creation of ex situ living collections of threatened plants like Espeletia. These collections serve as tools for research, education, and ecological restoration while fostering collaboration with local communities. By prioritizing sustainable, community-driven conservation efforts, the initiative challenges traditional “ark paradigm” approaches and promotes biodiversity management rooted in the ecosystems and populations most affected.

St. Louis scientists including LEC postdoctoral fellow, Stella Uiterwaal, collaborate on new study of wildlife in one of America’s greatest urban parks called the Forest Park Living Lab. The Forest Park Living Lab received a LEC seed grant in 2022.

The twin threats of climate change and loss of biodiversity on Earth are mobilizing scientists and policy makers to help ensure a future for humanity. The Living Earth Collaborative is leading the way.

Microbes of Diverse Ecosystems (mDivE-STL) Symposium held on Oct 3 by the Living Earth Collaborative focuses on the important but unseen role of microbes in diverse ecosystems.

Many people believe that climate change is pushing back the start of fall leaf color to later in the year. The general thinking is that the warmer conditions anticipated under climate change will mean that trees can “hang on” to their green, energy-producing leaves longer. But scientists do not actually see this happening across North American forests, according to LEC Biodiversity Fellow, Susanne S. Renner, an expert at Washington University in St. Louis.