Teaching

General Ecology, BIOL 3034, every spring semester.

 Community Ecology, BOT 4023/5023, Fall semesters of even-numbered years. Prerequisite: BIOL 3034 or equivalent. This class builds upon General Ecology and discusses questions of coexistence, stability, succession, equilibrium, gradient analysis, competition. It a literature and discussion-intensive course.

Advanced Ecology: Multivariate Methods, BOT 5533, Fall semesters of odd-numbered years. Prerequisite: coursework in ecology and at least one statistics class. This course is a combination of lectures and computer laboratories, with homework but no examinations. The main project consists of analyzing a large data set of the student's choosing (it can be part of the student's thesis or dissertation work). Several student projects in the past have lead to publications.

Biodiversity Seminar, BOT 5110.  Recent issues in the study of biodiversity, including Biogeography, Foundations of Ecology, Cryptic Biodiversity, Biodiversity statistics, Biodiversity in Agriculture, etc.

 

Research

I study the determinants of species richness at all spatial scales, from the microcosm to the continent. I have used a variety of methods, including meta-analysis of floristic data, greenhouse microcosms, computer simulations, permanent plot data, and field experiments. Particular projects include an analysis of North American floras, analysis of ordination methods, studies on microcommunities emerging from soil seed banks, the flora of the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve, the vegetation of the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve, the distribution of Costa Rican rain forest trees, analysis of species-area curves, methods for extrapolating biodiversity, applications of fractal geometry, forest dynamics in an old-growth North Carolina forest, succession following catastrophic wind disturbance in Minnesota, and several others. 

My two largest projects currently are the Floras of North America Project and the Plant Virus Biodiversity and Ecology project.  I also maintain the Ecology at OSU page.

I am eager to see applications for new graduate students, both at the Master's and PhD level.  My students have worked on projects ranging from theoretical to applied, fieldwork to lab work to computer work, Oklahoma studies to international studies, and grasslands to forests.  Potential thesis projects include theoretical modeling of biodiversity, mixed-species biofuels, the effects of mowing on tallgrass prairie vegetation, the flora of Payne County (or any other county in Oklahoma), the flora of some of our state's parks, seedling dynamics at forest edges, effects of exotic species on grassland plants, distance decay of vegetation,  experimental studies of biodiversity, and many others.  As an adjunct professor in zoology, I would be happy to advise biodiversity studies with an animal theme.

Recent Publications

Allen, M. S. and M. W. Palmer. 2011. Fire history of a prairie/forest boundary: more than 250 years of frequent fire in a North American tallgrass prairie. Journal of Vegetation Science 22:436-444. PDF

Cordova, C. E., W. C. Johnson, R. D. Mandel, and M. W. Palmer. 2011. Late Quaternary environmental change inferred from phytoliths and other soil-related proxies: Case studies from the central and southern Great Plains, USA. Catena 85:87-108.

McGlinn, D. J. and M. W. Palmer. 2011. Quantifying the influence of environmental texture on the rate of species turnover: evidence from two habitats. Plant Ecology 212:495-506. PDF

Baniya, C. B., T. Solhoy, Y. Gauslaa, and M. W. Palmer. 2010. The elevation gradient of lichen species richness in Nepal. Lichenologist 42:83-96.

Burton, J., M. W. Palmer, and S. Hallgren. 2010. Fire frequency affects structure and composition of xeric oak forests of eastern Oklahoma. Natural Areas Journal 30: 370-379.

Denslow, M. W., M. W. Palmer, and Z. E. Murrell. 2010. A bibliography of North Carolina local floras. Castanea 75(4):475-483. PDF

Denslow, M., M. Palmer, and Z. E. Murrell. 2010. Patterns of native and exotic plant richness along an elevational gradient from sea level to the summit of the Appalachian Mountains, USA. Journal of the Torrey Botanical Club 137:67-80. PDF

DeSantis, R. D., S. W. Hallgren, T. B. Lynch, J. A. Burton, and M. W. Palmer. 2010. Long-term directional changes in upland Quercus forests throughout Oklahoma, USA. Journal of Vegetation Science 21:606-615. PDF

Hackett, J., V. Muthukumar, G. Wiley, M. W. Palmer, B. Roe, and U. Melcher. 2010. Viruses in Oklahoma Euphorbia marginata. Proceedings of the Oklahoma Academy of Sciences 89:57-62.

Maier, R. M., M. W. Palmer, G. L. Andersen, M. J. Halonen, K. C. Josephson, R. S. Maier, F. D. Martinez, J. W. Neilson, D. A. Stern, D. Vercelli, and A. L. Wright. 2010. Environmental Determinants of and Impact on Childhood Asthma by the Bacterial Community in Household Dust. Applied and Environmental Microbiology 76:2663-2667.

Mansy, K., G. Gunderson, and M.W. Palmer. 2010. Design Guidelines for Sustainable Biological Field Stations. Oklahoma Academy of Sciences, Stillwater, Oklahoma. http://ecology.okstate.edu/FieldStations.pdf

McGlinn, D. J. and M. W. Palmer. 2010. Spatial structure alters the shape of the unimodal species richness-biomass relationship in a neutral model. Diversity 2:550-560. PDF

McGlinn, D. J., R. Churchwell, and M. W. Palmer. 2010. Effects of a tornado on a cross timbers bird community. Southwestern Naturalist 55:460-466. PDF

McGlinn, D. J., P. G. Earls, and M. W. Palmer. 2010. A twelve-year study on the scaling of vascular plant composition in an Oklahoma Tallgrass Prairie. Ecology 91:1872. PDF

van Els, P., R. Will, M. Palmer, and K. Hickman. 2010. Changes in forest understory associated with Juniperus virginiana encroachment in Oklahoma, USA. Applied Vegetation Science 13: 356-368

Allen, M. S., R. G. Hamilton, U. Melcher, and M. W. Palmer. 2009. Lessons from the Prairie: Research at The Nature Conservancy's Tallgrass Prairie Preserve. Oklahoma Academy of Sciences, Stillwater, Oklahoma. http://ecology.okstate.edu/Tgp_booklet_web.pdf

Chiarucci, A., G. Bacaro, D. Rocchini, C. Ricotta, M. W. Palmer, and S. M. Scheiner. 2009. Spatially constrained rarefaction: incorporating the autocorrelated structure of biological communities into sample-based rarefaction. Community Ecology 10:209-214. PDF

Grandlic, C. J., M. W. Palmer, and R. M. Maier. 2009. Optimization of plant growth-promoting bacteria-assisted phytostabilization of mine tailings. Soil Biology & Biochemistry 41:1734-1740. PDF

Lättman, H., P. Milberg, M. W. Palmer, and J.-E. Mattsson. 2009. Changes in the distributions of epiphytic lichens in southern Sweden using a new statistical method. Nordic Journal of Botany 27:413-418. PDF

Muthukumar, V., U. Melcher, M. L. Pierce, G. B. Wiley, B. Roe, M. W. Palmer, V. Thapa, A. Ali, and T. Ding. 2009. Non-cultivated plants of the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve of northeastern Oklahoma frequently contain virus-like sequences in particulate fractions. Virus Research. 141:169-173. PDF

 

For a complete publication list see here.