3 Nov: See comments on bibliographic format
People in Dr. Knox's group have less straightforward topics than the bacteria of Dr. Simurda's group. Your first task is to figure out what search terms are appropriate, and the best advice is to try a broad variety, and to look at a lot of material that won't make it into the final bibliography. Start with the seed reference provided (finding it may be the first challenge, reading it the second).

The initial stage of your search will be one of informing yourself about a broad topic, and then (with appropriate background) defining a specific area of study, which may involve limiting to specific species and/or ecological settings. You should stay in contact with Dr. Knox to make sure that what you're working on is appropriate from his point of view.

You are (for all intents and purposes) limited to journals we have in our library, including the various online journals (under exceptional circumstances InterLibrary Loan can be arranged, but don't bet the farm on it). That said, there's a lot to be learned from abstracts of articles from sources that are not in our library.

Much of your exploration will be done in online indexes, accessible via the Biology Department page and/or Library Gateway => Research Resources => Periodical Indexes. Choosing amongst the myriad possibilities is part of the fun, and no single source will tell you everything (but every source will tell you something).

Here are some worthwhile/exemplary links to web resources. These aren't the only ones or necessarily the best ones (and they generally aren't 'primary' or 'secondary' sources), but they do give an idea of what web resources can be good for.

  1. The importance of species diversity
    an AltaVista 'advanced search' for "species diversity near stability":
  2. Ecological consequences of cannibalism
    Search on AltaVista for "intraspecific predation" gives 7 hits
  3. Fire and seed germination
  4. Sympatric speciation in animals
  5. Phytochrome in seed germination
  6. Global warming and species distribution
  7. Phenology and competition/predation
  8. Disturbance in natural ecosystems
    I did some experimenting with BasicBIOSIS via the web version of FirstSearch and found a lot of relevant stuff by using the ADVANCED search option, with DE for one term and SU for another.

    Bibliographic format for Dr. Knox's group:

    It looks to me like most people haven't looked at the Ecology style in sufficient detail to get it right. As I said, it matters. Consider these four examples, and note their peculiarities:

    Fowler, S. V., and J. H. Lawton. 1985. Rapidly induced defenses and talking trees: the devil's advocate position. American Naturalist 126:181-195.

    Osborn, T. G. B. 1909. The lateral roots of Amyelon radicans and their mycorrhiza. Annals of Botany 23:603-611.

    Carroll, G. C. 1991. Fungal associates of woody plants as insect antagonists in leaves and stems. Pages 253-272 in P. Barbosa, V. A. Krischik, and C. G. Jones, editors. Microbial mediation of plant-herbivore interactions. John Wiley & Sons, New York, New York, USA.

    Andrewartha, H. G. and L. C. Birch. 1954. The distribution and abundance of animals. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois, USA.

    • Authors have initials only, with periods and spaces, and second authors have initials preceding the surname; "and" comes before the last author's name.
    • Journal titles are not abbreviated and not bold or underlined or italicized.
    • Journal volume numbersare bold, but issue numbers aren't given --just the inclusive pages of the article.
    • Citations of books and of articles in books follow a specific format, including the publisher and place of publication.