Community ecology
Master in Life Sciences, ENS – M1
2026-2027 - Semester 1
UNBIO1-039 - Community Ecology
6 ECTS
—2026-2027 Planning —
Year and Semester : M1 | S1
Where : Biology Department, ENS
Duration : from September, 2026 to January, 2027
Hours : 2pm-5pm (Tuesdays)
Coordination
Marion RICHARDOT, ENS
Regis FERRIERE, ENS, UA
Credits
6 ECTS
Keywords
Ecological networks | community dynamics | community phylogenetics | microbial diversity | biogeography | conservation.
Course Prerequisites
The targeted audience is advanced undergraduates and graduate students in ecology and evolutionary biology. Participants trained in other fields are welcome provided they had exposure to fundamental notions of ecology.
Course objectives and description
Aims : The purpose of this advanced course of ecology is to address important topics of current research in community ecology. Lectures will introduce the concepts and methods and take the students through recent developments. Practical sessions will allow students to explore datasets related to some of these questions.
Themes : Topics addressed include : the dynamics and conservation of ecological networks ; community assembly and the evolutionary origin of species diversity ; the stability and complex dynamics of large communities ; the use of omics tools to study marine microbial communities.
Organisation :
The course is scheduled on Tuesdays, 2-5pm, from September to January. Please see the schedule for details.
Part 1 : We will first take a conceptual and theoretical approach to community ecology. We will introduce concepts and quantitative models for the ecology and/or evolution of ecological communities.
Part 2 : We will then particularly investigate the specificities of microbial communities, including oceanic planktonic communities and host-associated microbiomes.
Part 3 : Finally, we will cover the field of conservation by investigating how biodiversity in natural or anthropogenic communities is affected by human-driven disturbances and how we can remediate it.
Assessment
The evaluation modality will be announced at the beginnin of class. It may involved a written exam, written essays, and/or oral presentations. Please note that the session of Tuesday, January 19, is reserved for the evaluation.
Course material
Slides used by instructors will be provided on Moodle.
Suggested reading in relationship with the module content
• • Bolker BM (2008) Ecological Models and Data in R. Princeton University Press.
• Brown JM (1995) Macroecology. Univ. of Chicago Press.
• Hubbell SP (2001) The Unified Neutral Theory of Biodiversity and Biogeography. Princeton Univ. Press.
• Loreau M (2010) From Populations to Ecosystems. Princeton Unversity Press.
• Magurran AE, McGill BJ (2011) Biological Diversity. Oxford University Press.
• Mittelbach GG, McGill BJ (2019) Community Ecology. Oxford University Press, 2nd edition.
• Morin P (2011) Community Ecology (2nd edition). Wiley-Blackwell.
• Pimm SL (2002) Food Webs. Univ. of Chicago Press.
• Rosenzweig ML (1995) Species Diversity in Space and Time. Cambridge Univ. Press.
• van Straalen NM, Roelofs D (2006) Introduction to Ecological Genomics. Oxford Univ. Press.
This web page contains dynamic models to enhance the book Community Ecology (2nd Edition) by Gary Mittelbach & Brian McGill : https://communityecologybook.org/
