Table of Contents

Preface ix 1.MacArthur and Wilson's Radical Theory 3 2.On Current Theories of Relative Species Abundance 30 3.Dynamical Models of the Relative Abundance of Species 48 4.Local Community Dynamics under Ecological Drift 76 5.Metacommunity Dynamics and the Unified Theory 113 6.The Unified Theory and Dynamical Species-Area Relationships 152 7.Metapopulations and Biodiversity on the Metacommunity Landscape 202 8.Speciation, Phylogeny, and the Evolution of Metacommunity Biodiversity 231 9.Sampling, Parameter Estimation, and the Generality of the Unified Theory 281 10.Reconciling Dispersal-Assembly and Niche-Assembly Theories 319 Literature Cited 347 Index 371

Promotional Information

This provocative and enlightening work, deeply original and supported by some of the most extensive field research ever conducted in biology, will be regarded as one of the most important contributions to ecology and biogeography of the past half century. -- Edward O. Wilson, author of "Biodiversity" This book should be a true landmark, a revolutionary and compelling treatment that can do for community ecology what neutrality theory did for molecular and population genetics. Building on the conceptual foundations of island biogeography, Hubbell erects a grand null hypothesis establishing, in this case, a novel conceptual framework for virtually all further attempts at interpetating the composite distributions and abundances of species, in any environment and at any trophic level. I hope that this work will be discussed and embraced by the ecological community to the extent that it clearly merits. -- John Avise, University of Georgia This book presents a new theory that seeks to unify the two approaches of population biology: biodiversity and biogeography. I expect that it will immediately be considered essential reading by biogeographers and ecologists... Its review of the literature is extensive and valuable. The author's writing style is graceful and reads well. -- Jared Diamond, author of "Guns, Germs, and Steel" This book is important and inspiring. It will surely stimulate renewed and long overdue interest in broad-scale patterns of species distributions and abundances--the core of community ecology. -- Mark A. McPeek, Dartmouth College

About the Author

Stephen P. Hubbell is Professor of Plant Biology at the University of Georgia and Staff Scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama. He is the author of more than one hundred papers in tropical plant ecology, theoretical ecology, and plant-animal interactions. He has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Pew Scholar Award in Conservation and the Environment. He is Chairman of the National Council for Science and the Environment (formerly the Committee for the National Institute for the Environment) and the inventor of Extinction: The Game of Ecology.

Reviews

Highly innovative and insightful... Ideas are conveyed clearly and the addition of summary points at the end of each chapter facilitates assimilation."--Richard T. Busing, Ecological Engineering "Hubbell's book is a very exciting one, deeply original, based on extensive field data, and convincing in its 'simple' explanations of many broad-scale patterns in biodiversity and biogeography. It will probably cause controversies, but primarily stimulate further research."--Gottfried Jetschke, Ecology "[This] is a rich book about an idea that has the power to re-produce generic patterns and that will be in the back of your mind when you, again, try to make sense of the plethora of articles on species diversity, abundance and distribution."--Carsten F. Dormann, Basic and Applied Ecology "A rich book about an idea that has the power to re-produce generic patterns and that will be in the back of your mind when you, again, try to make sense of the plethora of articles on species diversity, abundance and distribution... Once you start reading it, you will find it not a page too long."--Carsten F. Dormann, Basic Applied Ecology "This is an important contribution to the development of a much sought-after explanation of pattern and process in an increasingly threatened global resource."--Michael E. Meadows, Environmental Conservation "Hubbell has produced a book for all those who think about how communities are put together, even the not so mathematically minded... [It] is sure to influence how community ecology is done for years to come."--Sandra Knapp, Biological Conservation