Brian Joseph Enquist is an American biologist and academic. Enquist is a Professor of Biology at the

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it was the first university in the Arizona Territory. T ...

. He is also external professor at the Santa Fe Institute. He is a biologist, plant biologist and an

ecologist Ecology () is the study of the relationships between living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere level. Ecology overlaps wi ...

. He was elected as a Fellow of the

American Association for the Advancement of Science The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific respons ...

(AAAS) in 2012 and the Ecological Society of America (ESA) in 2018.

Research

His lab works on developing a more integrative, quantitative, and predictive framework for biology, community ecology, and large-scale ecology. His research is notable for three areas in biology and ecology: (1) ''Scaling in Biology'' – Enquist is notable in biology for his work with Geoffrey West and James H. Brown, in understanding the origin and diversity of organismal form, function, and diversity by developing general models for the origin of allometry and scaling laws in biology. This research, shows how general scaling laws underlie organismal form, function, and diversity and can be used to 'scale up' biological processes from genes to cells to ecosystems. This work is also the foundation for the Metabolic Theory of Ecology. (2) ''Functional Plant Ecology and Trait-based biology'' – Enquist has worked to develop Trait Driver Theory or TDT with Van M. Savage, Jon Norberg and colleagues. TDT provides a general theory of

Functional ecology Functional ecology is a branch of ecology that focuses on the roles, or functions, that species play in the community or ecosystem in which they occur. In this approach, physiological, anatomical, and life history characteristics of the species a ...

in that it provides a baseline for (i) recasting the predictions of ecological theories based on species richness (see

Coexistence theory Coexistence theory is a framework to understand how competitor traits can maintain species diversity and stave-off competitive exclusion even among similar species living in ecologically similar environments. Coexistence theory explains the st ...

) in terms of the shape of trait distributions and (ii) integrating

Metabolic Scaling Theory Metabolism (, from el, μεταβολή ''metabolē'', "change") is the set of life-sustaining chemical reactions in organisms. The three main functions of metabolism are: the conversion of the energy in food to energy available to run cell ...

how specific traits, including body size, and functional diversity then ‘scale up’ to influence ecosystem functioning and the dynamics of species assemblages across climate gradients. Further, TDT offers a novel framework to integrate trait, metabolic/allometric, and species-richness-based approaches and theory to better predict functional biogeography and how assemblages of species have and may respond to climate change.

Education and honors

Education

Enquist received a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

in Biology in 1991 from Colorado College and a

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is a ...

in Biology in 1998 from the

University of New Mexico The University of New Mexico (UNM; es, Universidad de Nuevo México) is a public research university in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Founded in 1889, it is the state's flagship academic institution and the largest by enrollment, with over 25,400 ...

Honors

*George Mercer Award ( Ecological Society of America), (2001) *Honorary Degree, PhD in Science, Colorado College, (2007). *Eminent Ecologist, Kellogg Biological Station, (2010) *Visiting Fellow

Oxford Martin School The Oxford Martin School is a research and policy unit based in the Social Sciences Division of the University of Oxford. It was founded in June 2005 as the James Martin 21st Century School and is located in the original building of the Indian I ...

, Oxford University, UK, (2017) *ESA FellowESA Fellow
/ref> Ecological Society of America, (2018)

References

External links

Home Page
* * ttps://web.archive.org/web/20160207224317/http://www.aspenideas.org/session/climate-change-and-fate-our-forests" 2014 Aspen Ideas Festival - Climate change and the fate of our forestsbr>2017 Oxford Martin School Lectures - The concept of time in biology, and the unity of life

Enquist's 2015 public lecture 'Life on Earth: By Chance or By Law?'
{{DEFAULTSORT:Enquist, Brian Colorado College alumni University of New Mexico alumni Living people American ecologists 1969 births University of Arizona faculty Place of birth missing (living people) Fellows of the Ecological Society of America