Our
people
Professor Tim Benton
Title
Pro Dean for Research – Faculty of Biological Sciences
T.G.Benton@leeds.ac.uk
Phone
0113 3437600 or contact Nicola Turner (PA) on 0113 3432863
Address
7.07 LC Miall
University of Leeds
Leeds
LS2 9JT
BHRC Role
BHRC Executive member
About
Tim’s PhD was on the behaviour and ecology of scorpions, after which he spent some time working on Pacific biogeography, aphid behavioural ecology before moving into population dynamics. Tim’s main work involves looking at the way that variation in the environment causes variation in life-histories and thus variation in population dynamics, and works with models and model systems (soil mites, farmland ecology), within an evolutionary and conservation framework. Tim was lecturer and senior lecturer in Stirling, senior lecturer in Aberdeen and came to Leeds as professor in 2005. He was Director of the Institute of Integrative and Comparative Biology from 2005 to July 2007 and became Pro-Dean for Research in August 2000
Tim’s interests in the determinants of population dynamics are driven from an underlying conservation interest. In a world that is changing, how can we predict what the population dynamics will do? Any answer to this involves understanding how the environment (whether it’s the physical environment or, for example, population density) affects organism’s life-histories, and, in turn affects the population dynamics. This work involves empirical work (using a laboratory model organism, a soil mite) and theoretical work, primarily to understand the interaction between environmental noise and deterministic factors (such as density dependence). There is an evolutionary focus to some of the work because as life-histories (and their plasticity) evolve so do population dynamics, and population dynamics in turn asserts selection pressures on life-histories.
In related research, it has become very apparent that agriculture has huge impacts on the biodiversity of the farmed landscape. Tim is interested in the relationships between farming practice, invertebrates and bird populations, specifically in the way changing resources (e.g. insects = bird food) cause changes in bird life histories and therefore dynamics.
Grants Awarded
- 2002-5 NERC. Standard grant. The biology of the lag. £226,400
- 2003-5 NERC. Small grant. Reproductive Allocation decisions. £30,304
- 2004-7 NERC. UK PopNet grant. Modelling farmland birds. £153,102 (UK PopNet project grant with Bill Sutherland, UEA (lead PI), Benton and Xavier Lambin, Aberdeen)
- 2004-6 NERC. Standard grant. Life history and population dynamics of Mauritius kestrels. Ken Norris, Reading, (lead PI) & Benton. £93,348
- 2005-8 NERC. Standard grant. Harvesting and environmental variability: the causes and consequences of evolution in ecological time. (S.Piertney, Aberdeen co-I). £271,787
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