Dr. Daniel Montesinos Torres
Position: Senior Research Fellow – Invasive plant ecologist
Department: Australian Tropical Herbarium
University/Institute/Company: James Cook University
About
I am based at the Australian Tropical Herbarium in Cairns, Queensland, and I am broadly interested in the evolutionary ecology of plants. My main focus of research is on the rapid evolution of locally adapted traits of invasive species across broad biogeographical scales, with a special focus on reproduction and reproductive systems. Biogeographic comparisons of closely related invasive and non-invasive species provide novel insights into invasive ecology. My work exemplifies how even non-invasive exotic species are adapting constantly to their non-native ranges, and that many of the trait-shifts detected between native and non-native ranges of invasive species are frequently found also for less successful non-invasive exotics. Our results suggest that local adaptation and reproductive isolation can occur at fastest rates than it was previously thought, and might have broad biogeographic implications for the understanding of allopatry and speciation processes. I am the Editor-in-Chief of Web Ecology, journal of the European Ecological Federation. Follow me on Twitter @plant_ecology
Disciplines: Biology
- Biology: Botany, Ecology, Evolutionary Biology
