A decade has now passed since Hubbell published The Unified Neutral Theory of
Biodiversity and Biogeography. Neutral theory highlights the importance of dispersal …

Species abundance distributions (SADs) follow one of ecology's oldest and most universal
laws–every community shows a hollow curve or hyperbolic shape on a histogram with many …

Despite its supreme importance and the threat of its global crash, biodiversity remains poorly
understood both empirically and theoretically. This ambitious book presents a new, general …

Hubbell's neutral theory of biodiversity has challenged the classic niche-based view of
ecological community structure. Although there have been many attempts to falsify Hubbell's …

The simplest theories often have much merit and many limitations, and, in this vein, the
value of neutral theory (NT) of biodiversity has been the subject of much debate over the …

Metapopulation models have been instrumental in quantifying the ecological impact of
landscape structure on the survival of a focal species. However, extensions to multiple …

A formidable many-body problem in ecology is to understand the complex of factors
controlling patterns of relative species abundance (RSA) in communities of interacting …

Ewens's sampling formula exemplifies the harmony of mathematical theory, statistical
application, and scientific discovery. The formula not only contributes to the foundations of …

The species–abundance distribution (SAD) describes the abundances of all species within a
community. Many different models have been proposed to describe observed SADs. Best …

Ecology Letters (2010) 13: 716–727 Abstract Understanding the maintenance and origin of
biodiversity is a formidable task, yet many ubiquitous ecological patterns are predicted by a …