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Cynthia L. Sagers

Cynthia L. Sagers

Phone: 575-7195
csagers@uark.edu

Degrees:

Ph.D. University of Utah, 1993
B.A. University of Iowa 1982

Research Interests:

Mutualisms, reciprocally beneficial associations between species, are a ubiquitous component of biological communities.  Benefits to each participant may vary over space and time, however, making the precise nature of the interaction conditional upon the environment.  In ant-homopteran associations, for example, benefits varied between years as a function of population densities and with the availability of alternative food sources.  In the latter case, ants that were given a carbohydrate supplement ate the homopterans they once tended.  When the outcome of an interaction is conditional upon the environment, environmental factors may direct the evolutionary trajectory of a species pair and alter the rate at which characteristics of the mutualism evolve.  How environment determines the ecological and evolutionary pay-offs of an interaction, then, has become a central question in the study of mutualism, and is a focus of research in my lab.

Academic Interests:

Plant population biology/evolutionary ecology

Lab Website:

Click here to go to Dr. Sagers' lab website.

Recent Publications:

Bautista, N. S., C. L. Sagers and L. S. Watrud. 2008. Maternal effects in advanced hybrids of genetically modified and non-genetically modified Brassica species. in review.

Sagers, C. L. and P. D. Coley. 2007. Beneficios y costos de defense en un arbusto del neotrópico. In N. Gomez and EG Leigh (eds.) Ecología y Evolución en los Trópicos, Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D.C.

Sagers, C. L. and F. Goggin. 2007. Isotopic enrichment in a phloem-feeding insect: effects of nutrient and water availability. Oecologia 151:464-472.

Trimble, S. T. and C. L. Sagers. 2004. Differential patterns of host use in two highly specialized ant-plant associations: evidence from stable isotopes. Oecologia 138:74-82.

Lyon, J. and C.L. Sagers. 2003. Correspondence analysis of functional groups in a riparian landscape. Plant Ecology 164:173-181.