Brennen Fagan
Postdoctoral Research Associate, Leverhulme Centre for Anthropocene Biodiversity
Mathematics of Biodiversity Change
Biography
I am a Postdoctoral Research Associate with LCAB and the Department of Mathematics studying the Mathematics of Biodiversity Change.
I received my undergraduate degree at California State University, Fresno with the Smittcamp Family Honors College and my PhD in Mathematics from the University of York on a departmental teaching studentship. My PhD studied historical war data with the York Historical Warfare Analysis Group to better understand human conflict.
LCAB provides grounds for interdisciplinary collaboration: I work with colleagues from Archaeology, Biology, and History regularly, and have been exploring topics with colleagues from Environment & Geography and English. This diversity of backgrounds allows for more holistic approaches to tackling some of the central problems of our time.
Research
At LCAB, I juggle dual roles relating to my interests in computational mathematics and statistical and mathematical modelling. My main project at LCAB uses a mathematical model of an ecosystem to investigate questions about how dispersal, land use change, and our ability to observe our environment change biodiversity and reports thereof. In particular, do two studies studying the same thing in different ways get the same results?
Outside my main project, I collaborate on projects including modelling the evolution of maternal transmission, modelling the diversity of pollen grains over the Holocene, and the ecosystems of the Lake District. More generally, my mathematical interests are broadly in the applications of statistical and computational methods including AI, and so have been involved in various modelling, statistics and computing help groups in LCAB. Outside mathematics, I am also interested include decision making and past, future, and fictional ecologies.
In parallel to my roles in LCAB, my research also touches on historical decision-making and modelling historical and socio/physical processes.
I currently co-supervise 3 PhD students: Becky Coston, Luke Misra, and Eilidh Thompson.
Publication highlights
Fagan, B., Pitchford, J. W., Stepney, S., & Thomas, C. D. (2023). Increased dispersal explains increasing local diversity with global biodiversity declines. Global Change Biology, 2023.06.09.544194.
Fagan, B. T., Constable, G. W. A., & Law, R. (2024). Maternal transmission as a microbial symbiont sieve, and the absence of lactation in male mammals. Nature Communications, 15(1), 5341.
Fagan, B., Horwood, I., MacKay, N., Price, C., & Wood, A. J. (2023). Quantifying Counterfactual Military History. CRC Press.