M. Isidora Ávila-Thieme- PhD Biological Sciences (Ecology mention)
- PostDoc at Advanced Conservation Strategies
M. Isidora Ávila-Thieme
- PhD Biological Sciences (Ecology mention)
- PostDoc at Advanced Conservation Strategies
About
36
Publications
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Introduction
I am an ecologist interested in understanding how the structure and dynamics of ecological networks respond to different perturbations. I use a combination of mathematical and computational approaches that are parameterized with empirical information.
My current research is focused on understanding the relative importance of artisanal fisheries on Benthic Chilean food webs. My final goal is producing useful scientific information for fisheries management.
Skills and Expertise
Current institution
Advanced Conservation Strategies
Current position
- PostDoc
Publications
Publications (36)
Rising global seafood demand poses increasing challenges for sustainable fishery management. This is particularly the case in the Global South, where many small-scale fisheries are likely to expand as they gain access to larger markets. Using Chile as a case study, we assess brachyuran crab fisheries and provide a forward-looking view on the sustai...
The European rabbit has invaded numerous ecosystems worldwide, but rarely steppes. Since its various introduction attempts into the ecosystems of the Magallanes/Fuegian region, the rabbit has become a key player, interacting with species at different trophic levels and generating impacts on ecosystems. To better understand the role of the rabbit in...
Stochastic cellular automata (SCA) are models that describe spatial ecological dynamics using a grid of cells that switch between discrete states over time, depending only on the current state (Markov chain process). They are widely used to understand how small-scale processes scale up to affect ecological dynamics at larger spatial scales, and hav...
The European rabbit has invaded numerous ecosystems around the world, but rarely steppes. We studied the food web in the Magallanes region of southernmost Chile, where the rabbit is now a key player, interacting with species at different trophic levels. Because the rabbit is currently well embedded in the Magellanic/Fuegian ecosystem, especially in...
(1) Earth’s biosphere is undergoing drastic reorganization due to the sixth mass extinction brought on by the Anthropocene. Impacts of local and regional extirpation of species have been demonstrated to propagate through the complex interaction networks they are part of, leading to secondary extinctions and exacerbating biodiversity loss. Contempor...
Species diversity underpins all ecosystem services that support life. Despite this recognition and the great advances in detecting biodiversity, exactly how many and which species co-occur and interact, directly or indirectly in any ecosystem is unknown. Biodiversity accounts are incomplete; taxonomically, size, habitat, mobility or rarity biased....
Scientific information to properly manage resources, improve sustainability of exploited ecosystems and conserve biodiversity will never be sufficient to provide a ‘how-to’ user manual for managers and conservation agencies. Yet, scientists must still provide guidelines to preserve the ecosystem services on which life depends and help us navigate a...
The European rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus) was introduced to central Chile in the mid 18th century. Rabbits are among the invasive species that most affect Chilean ecosystems and their productive uses. The most negative impacts of rabbits have been reported in Chilean islands and the continental sclerophyllous forest. In Chile, the impacts of this...
The European rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus) is one of the main invasive species in Chile, where it became naturalized ca. 150 years ago. Their high reproductive capacity, lack of specialist predators, and great adaptability favored the settlement of rabbits in diverse mainland and island ecosystems of the country. Recently, rabbits have become cent...
While restauranteurs are important actors in seafood systems, information on their decisions and views on sustainability is lacking. Using mixed methods, we explored Chilean restauranters’ contexts, decisions, and views on seafood sustainability. Menus in Chile are diverse and dominated by domestic and wild-caught sources. Restauranters are willing...
El presente estudio implementa la hoja de ruta denominada “gran impulso para la sostenibilidad” propuesta por la CEPAL utilizando a Chile como caso de estudio. La ruta se genera adoptando una perspectiva de límites planetarios para calcular las brechas ambientales de Chile y con miras a la identificación de políticas públicas que fomenten el desarr...
Ecological interactions are found across ecosystems, facilitating comparison among systems with distinct species composition. The balance of positive and agonistic interactions among species may be sensitive to variation in the diversity and abundance of species in a community. We studied marine interaction networks among reef fishes on two oceanic...
Top-down and bottom-up forces determine ecosystem function and dynamics. Fisheries as a top-down force can shorten and destabilize food webs, while effects driven by climate change can alter the bottom-up forces of primary productivity. We assessed the response of a highly-resolved intertidal food web to these two global change drivers, using netwo...
Top-down and bottom-up forces determine ecosystem function and dynamics. Fisheries as a top-down force can shorten and destabilize food-webs, while climate-change driven effects can alter the bottom-up forces of primary productivity. We assessed the response of a highly-resolved intertidal food-web to these two global-change drivers, using network...
1. Biodiversity loss is one of the current drivers of global change with an acute impact on community structure. Different measures and tools (e.g., simulations of extinction events) have been developed to analyze the structure of ecological systems and their stability under biodiversity loss, especially in complex settings with multiple interactin...
Biodiversity loss is one of the current drivers of global change with an acute impact on community structure. Different measures and tools (e.g., simulations of extinction events) have been developed to analyze the structure of ecological systems and their stability under biodiversity loss, especially in complex settings with multiple interacting s...
Fisheries are threatening marine biodiversity, but global warming might worsen their adverse effects due to an expected reduction in the global biomass of the most basal species of food-webs, plankton. We use an allometric trophic network model to analyze the independent and combined effects of small-scale artisanal fisheries and climate change on...
de Investigación en Biodiversidad y Ambientes Sustentables (CIBAS). Ecological trophic networks may involve complex interactions where the loss of a single species could trigger a cascade of secondary extinctions. However, such effects are not easily analyzed or interpreted due to low resolution and different characteristics of the available networ...
Species loss is a non-random reality that worldwide ecosystems are living and the understanding of their consequences is a major challenge in ecology. In natural ecosystems, species are part of a complex network of ecological relationships. Hence, the loss of one species could trigger secondary extinction cascades difficult to predict. Therefore, i...
Species loss is a non-random reality that worldwide ecosystems are living and the understanding of their consequences is a major challenge in ecology. In natural ecosystems, species are part of a complex network of ecological relationships. Hence, the loss of one species could trigger secondary extinction cascades difficult to predict. Therefore, i...
The objectives of the NetworkExtinction package is to analyze and visualize the topology of food webs and its responses to the simulated extinction of species
En herbívoros intermareales la ingesta de animales se interpreta como casual, pero sus implicancias ecofisiológicas son desconocidas. Evidencia reciente sugiere que estos supuestos herbívoros sí digerirían y asimilarían animales. Mediante isótopos estables se evaluó la asimilación de presas animales en el ambiente y la contribución de cada presa a...
Las diferencias en estructura, morfología y relación superficie/volumen de las algas intermareales podrían determinar su capacidad de captar nutrientes y su potencial de fotosíntesis y crecimiento. Si esto ocurre, es probable que la variación espacial intra-localidad en movimiento de agua y características del oleaje, asociada a una mayor disponibi...
In the last 50 years, the trophic role of consumers has become a main research topic in the ecology of Chilean rocky shores, and in other regions. Several studies have typified species of echinoderms, crustaceans and mollusks as the most important herbivores and carnivores of intertidal assemblages. Unfortunately, little is known about the diet and...
Numerosas especies intermareales chilenas hacen un amplio co-uso de recursos, pero su potencial de competencia ha sido escasamente evaluado, y es relevante determinar si los patrones de variabilidad espacio-temoral de sus nichos tróficos son consistentes con la posibilidad de esta interacción. Para ello evaluamos estacionalmente (otoño 2005-otoño 2...
Un aspecto poco conocido en comunidades intermareales es el grado y forma en que la variación trófica intra e inter-individual determinan la variación en amplitud y composición del nicho poblacional. Estudios recientes muestran que numerosos consumidores co-utilizan un alto número de recursos y exhiben alta fluctuación dietaria dentro y entre comun...
Salmon farming is a widespread activity around the world, also known to promote diverse environmental effects on aquatic ecosystems. However, information regarding the impact of salmon farming on bird assemblages is notably scarce. We hypothesize that salmon farming, by providing food subsidies and physical structures to birds, will change their lo...
El nicho trófico, atributo clave en el estudio de las comunidades, usualmente se estima a nivel poblacional agregando los nichos individuales, lo que conduciría a caracterizaciones inconsistentes (e.g. definir especies generalistas cuando sus individuos actúan como especialistas), o conclusiones erróneas sobre potenciales interacciones competitivas...
La variación del nicho trófico poblacional es un aspecto crucial (explícito o implícito) en numerosas hipótesis ecológicas asociadas al uso y co-uso de recursos, aunque este énfasis ha desatendido el rol de la variación trófica intra-poblacional (especialización/diferenciación entre individuos), ligado a los componentes intra- e inter-fenotípicos d...
La surgencia puede influir en la diversidad en comunidades litorales, actuando de manera distinta a través de la costa y generando variaciones entre comunidades. A su vez, la capacidad y eficiencia de las macroalgas para captar nutrientes puede variar en función de su grado de complejidad estructural, relacionado negativamente con su relación super...
