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Research in Wiens’ lab has three main areas: (1) using an integrative phylogenetic approach to address general conceptual questions in evolutionary biology and ecology, (2) the theory and methods of phylogenetics, and (3) the phylogeny, evolution, and ecology of reptiles and amphibians. Within these general areas, we address a variety of specific topics, including species richness patterns, speciation, niche evolution and conservatism, life-history evolution, adaptive radiation, ecological diversification, rates and patterns of morphological change, phylogenomics, and responses of species to climate change. We combine collection and analysis of genetic, morphological, ecological, and physiological data (in the lab and field) with bioinformatic, computational, and theoretical approaches.Show Less
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Courses
- HHerpetology
- REEResearch in Ecology and Evolution
- TDLThe Diversity of Life
Grants
- Collaborative Research: Understanding Large-scale Patterns of Ecomorph Evolution
Principal Investigator (PI)
2017
$278.9K
News
- Freshwater habitats are fragile pockets of exceptional biodiversity, study finds
2022
- Battling Bugs Help Solve Mysteries of Weapon Evolution
2021
- New Research Helps Explain Diversity of Life and Paradox of Sex
2021
- One-Third of Plant and Animal Species Could be Gone in 50 Years
2020
- Plants and Animals Aren't So Different When it Comes to Climate
2020
- Do Big Tadpoles Turn into Big Frogs? It's Complicated, Study Finds
2020
- COVID-19, Asteroid Dust and Crane Flies: UArizona's Top Stories of 2020
2020
- Study Traces Evolution of Acoustic Communication
2020
- The Paleozoic Diet: Why Animals Eat What They Eat
2019
- The Secret behind Coral Reef Diversity? Time. Lots of Time.
2018
- Three Ways to Be a Winner in the Game of Evolution
2017
- Climate Change May Move Too Quickly for Grasses
2016
- Leaping Lizards: Quirky Facts About Those Resident Reptiles
2016
- UA-Led Study Resolves Reptilian Family Tree
2015
- Land Animals Proliferate Faster Than Aquatic Counterparts
2015
- No Matter the Continent, the World's Frogs Have a Lot in Common, UA Biologist Finds
2013
- UA Study: Evolution Too Slow to Keep Up With Climate Change
2013
Publications (63)
Recent
- Microhabitat and climatic-niche change explain patterns of diversification among frog families
2017
- Comparing macroecological patterns across continents: evolution of climatic niche breadth in varanid lizards
2017
- Extinction and time help drive the marine-terrestrial biodiversity gradient: is the ocean a deathtrap?
2017
- Rapid diversification and time explain amphibian species richness at different scales in the Tropical Andes, Earth's most biodiverse hotspot
2017
- Out of the dark: 350 million years of conservatism and evolution in diel activity patterns in vertebrates
2017
- Inordinate fondness multiplied and redistributed: the number of species on Earth and the new Pie of Life
2017
- What explains patterns of diversification and richness among animal phyla?
2017
- What explains patterns of biodiversity across the Tree of Life?
2017
- The origin of species richness patterns along environmental gradients: uniting explanations based on time, diversification rate, and carrying capacity
2017
- Phylogenomic analyses of more than 4,000 nuclear loci resolve the origin of snakes among lizard families
2017
- Testing Convergence Versus History: Convergence Dominates Phenotypic Evolution for over 150 Million Years in Frogs
2016
- How Should Genes and Taxa be Sampled for Phylogenomic Analyses with Missing Data? An Empirical Study in Iguanian Lizards
2016
- Combining phylogenomic and supermatrix approaches, and a time-calibrated phylogeny for squamate reptiles (lizards and snakes) based on 52 genes and 4162 species
2016
- Do missing data influence the accuracy of divergence-time estimation with BEAST?
2015
- Faster diversification on land than sea helps explain global biodiversity patterns among habitats and animal phyla
2015
- Evolutionary and ecological causes of species richness patterns in North American angiosperm trees
2015
- Herbivory increases diversification across insect clades
2015
- When do species-tree and concatenated estimates disagree? An empirical analysis with higher-level scincid lizard phylogeny
2015
- Explaining large-scale patterns of vertebrate diversity
2015
- Integrated Analyses Resolve Conflicts over Squamate Reptile Phylogeny and Reveal Unexpected Placements for Fossil Taxa
2015
- Causes of warm-edge range limits: Systematic review, proximate factors and implications for climate change
2014
- Evolution of climatic niche specialization: a phylogenetic analysis in amphibians
2014
- EVOLUTION OF PAEDOMORPHOSIS IN PLETHODONTID SALAMANDERS: ECOLOGICAL CORRELATES AND RE-EVOLUTION OF METAMORPHOSIS
2014
- Using historical biogeography to test for community saturation
2014
- Should genes with missing data be excluded from phylogenetic analyses?
2014
- Climatic niche breadth and species richness in temperate treefrogs
2014
- How does climate influence speciation?
2013
- Ecological causes of decelerating diversification in carnivoran mammals
2013
- A phylogeny and revised classification of Squamata, including 4161 species of lizards and snakes
2013
- Evolution of viviparity: a phylogenetic test of the cold-climate hypothesis in phrynosomatid lizards
2013
- Large-scale phylogenetic analyses reveal the causes of high tropical amphibian diversity
2013
- Evolutionary lag times and recent origin of the biota of an ancient desert (Atacama-Sechura)
2013
- Parapatric divergence of sympatric morphs in a salamander: Incipient speciation on Long Island?
2013
- Explaining Andean megadiversity: the evolutionary and ecological causes of glassfrog elevational richness patterns
2013
- Contrasting global-scale evolutionary radiations: Phylogeny, diversification, and morphological evolution in the major clades of iguanian lizards
2013
- What determines the climatic niche width of species? The role of spatial and temporal climatic variation in three vertebrate clades
2013
- How does climate change cause extinction?
2013
- Corrigendum to Quintero Wiens (2013)
2013
- Rates of projected climate change dramatically exceed past rates of climatic niche evolution among vertebrate species
2013
- Diversity and niche evolution along aridity gradients in north american lizards (phrynosomatidae)
2013
- Evolutionary conservatism and convergence both lead to striking similarity in ecology, morphology and performance across continents in Frogs
2013
- Phylogeny, ecology, and the origins of climate-richness relationships
2012
- Estimating divergence dates and evaluating dating methods using phylogenomic and mitochondrial data in squamate reptiles
2012
- Highly incomplete taxa can rescue phylogenetic analyses from the negative impacts of limited taxon sampling
2012
- Ecological radiation with limited morphological diversification in salamanders
2012
- Why are there so few fish in the sea?
2012
- Phylogenetic analyses reveal unexpected patterns in the evolution of reproductive modes in frogs
2012
- Resolving the phylogeny of lizards and snakes (Squamata) with extensive sampling of genes and species
2012
- Phylogeny of iguanian lizards inferred from 29 nuclear loci, and a comparison of concatenated and species-tree approaches for an ancient, rapid radiation
2011
- Crest evolution in newts: Implications for reconstruction methods, sexual selection, phenotypic plasticity and the origin of novelties
2011
- Re-evolution of lost mandibular teeth in frogs after more than 200 million years, and re-evaluating dollo's law
2011
- Phylogenetic origins of local-scale diversity patterns and the causes of Amazonian megadiversity
2011
- The phylogeny of advanced snakes (Colubroidea), with discovery of a new subfamily and comparison of support methods for likelihood trees
2011
- A large-scale phylogeny of Amphibia including over 2800 species, and a revised classification of extant frogs, salamanders, and caecilians
2011
- The causes of species richness patterns across space, time, and clades and the role of ecological limits
2011
- The niche, biogeography and species interactions
2011
- Missing data in phylogenetic analysis: Reconciling results from simulations and empirical data
2011
- What are the consequences of combining nuclear and mitochondrial data for phylogenetic analysis? Lessons from Plethodon salamanders and 13 other vertebrate clades
2011