Ecologie et biogéographie des vertébrés

The team "Biogéographie et écologie des vertébrés" is both a laboratory of the école Pratique des Hautes études (section des Sciences de la Vie et de la Terre) and a research team of the department "Dynamique et gouvernance des systèmes écologiques" de l'UMR 5175.

Three closely related axes of research:

1. Landscape changes (e.g., the closure of the vegetation cover after land abandonment in the north Mediterranean, or conversely the regression of the forest in the south), past and present climate changes, and violent disturbances like wildfires (often in interaction with the preceding factors) have submitted and still submit the Mediterranean faunas to severe constraints. Evaluating their consequences and analyzing the responses of the species and communities constitute the first axis of our research.
2. The biogeography and phylogeography of Mediterranean vertebrates (focusing on rare, threatened, fragmented, or insular taxa), the origin and structure of the faunas, the expansions, secondary contacts, retractions, fragmentations, the local extinctions and their causes, constitute a second axis of research, in interaction with the two others.
3. The study of vertebrate populations and communities of high conservation values, the identification of conservation units (esu), the design or evaluation of monitoring methods or demographic models adapted to rare and elusive species, the evaluation of conservation or management measures in connection with the organisms in charge of  biodiversity and protected areas, constitute the third axis of our research.