Welcome to the Smiley Lab at the Ecology and Evolution Department at Stony Brook University! We are a team of evolutionary ecologists interested in how climate and landscape history shape the diversity, bi ogeography, and ecological structure of faunas across spatio-temporal scales. We test hypotheses about how changes in climate, topographic complexity, and habitat heterogeneity impact communities and ecological processes at local scales and govern diversity at regional scales.

To do so, we use the fossil record to investigate diversity patterns and paleoecology, focusing on the history of small mammals and environments during the Cenozoic. Our work on the past is conducted in parallel with investigations of modern and historical small-mammal populations across climatic and environmental gradients today. Our work takes place across a range of geographic regions differing in habitats, topographic complexity, and geologic history. 

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To learn more about what we do and who we are, please visit the links above and follow us on Twitter.