William Wilson, Associate Professor
Education:
PhD Physics, University of Hawaii, 1988
BS Physics/Math, St. Cloud State University, 1981
Office Location: BioSci: 250
Office Phone: (919) 660-7346
Email Address: wgw@duke.edu
Web Page: http://www.biology.duke.edu/wilson
Specialties:
Ecology and Population Biology
.............(faculty research areas)
Research Categories: environmental topics
Research Description: My academic transformation to writing books on environmental topics, and away from primary research in theoretical evolutionary ecology, seems to be working. This transformation respects a major component of Duke's strategic plan: Knowledge in the Service of Society, which includes public engagement on environmental topics. Given the funding collapse for mathematical evolutionary ecology at both the federal and university levels, my academic direction has followed this university-wide commitment to outreach. In essence, I have extended my involvement on Durham City and County boards and commissions, and let that service feed into my academic interests and goals, with community service revealing a greater need for scientific understanding of several specific topics. I've served six years on Durham's Open Space and Trails (DOST) commission, and during the last three years I've focused on learning and writing about urban environments within an open space context. This new topic, at least for me, has been an interesting one, and my goal has been a tradebook on the utility of urban trees. This summer I submitted a revised version (for the third set of reviews) at The University of Chicago Press. The book has grown successively more technical with each set of reviews, and the latest version takes the form of a 300-page textbook. In early December I learned that the editorial board accepted it for publication, and it is presently scheduled to come out by Fall 2010. Writing books inherently takes much more time than writing papers, and my productivity reflects this fact; this book represents the culmination of three years of reading, learning, teaching, and writing. Primary research costs real money, but book-writing mostly takes time and journal access, and, though stressful, I have adjusted my long range plans and expectations in light of an absence of even minimal financial support. As such, my major goals include recasting my urban environments textbook as a truly accessible trade-book, which UChicago Press expressed continued interest along with their acceptance of the present manuscript. My next major, and new, topic involves urban stormwater runoff, which I've come to realize is a major environmental problem. This issue came to the forefront while serving as DOST's representative to Durham's Environmental Enhancements to the Unified Development Ordinance Committee. This committee includes representatives of the local environmental, governmental, and development communities working ``together" to tighten the environmental aspects of new development rules in Durham County. Service on that committee revealed that relatively few folks are aware of stormwater problems, and those that are have an insufficient background to deal fully with the issues. Much of the discussion centers around science from the 1960s and 1970s, with state and county regulations being particularly ill-suited to new issues. My task will be to make the topic interesting to a larger audience, and bring new science to the fore. As the beginning step in this topic I'm running a graduate seminar on stormwater during Spring 2010. Finally, I've applied to join Durham County's Farmland Protection Board, and have started attending those meetings. The primary issue involves preserving agricultural open space as old farmers retire. At that point, farmland becomes endangered with several potential, non-agricultural fates, and one of the board's goals is to facilitate passing the land to new farmers, preserving that particular land-use. That transition is fraught with difficulties, with many legal demands, and I've begun helping connect the Farm Board with members of the Duke Law School community. I have yet to see any academic scholarship opportunities, but I'm keeping my eyes out.
Recent Publications (More Publications) (search)
- W. Wilson, Cuddington, K., W.G. Wilson, and A.M. Hastings. 2009. Ecosystem engineers: Feedback and population dynamics. The American Naturalist 173: 488-498. (2009) .
- Wilson, W.G & P. Lundberg, Non-neutral Community Dynamics: Empirical Predictions from Linearized Consumer--Resource Interactions, Oikos (Submitted, 2005) .
- S. Lion, M. van Baalen & W.G. Wilson, Host manipulation and parasite-induced dispersal, Proc. Roy. Soc. Lond. (Submitted, 2005) .
- Morris, W.F., W.G. Wilson, J.L. Bronstein & J. Ness, Environmental forcing and the temporal dynamics of a competitive guild of cactus-tending ants, Ecology (Accepted, 2005) (in press.) .
- C.A. Smith & W. Wilson, Evolutionarily stable dispersal distances with emergent pattern-formation and metapopulation dynamics, Oikos (Submitted, 2005) .
Duke Biology Box 90338 Durham, NC 27708 Phone: 919-660-7372 Fax: 919-660-7293