Ivette Perfecto is professor of Ecology and Natural Resources. Her research focuses on biodiversity in agricultural landscapes, primarily in the tropics. She also works on spatial ecology of the coffee agroecosystem and is interested more broadly on the links between small-scale sustainable agriculture, biodiversity and food sovereignty. She teaches General Ecology (Environ 281), Our Common Future (a course on globalization) (Environ 270), Food Land and Society (Environ 318) and Field Ecology (SNRE 556). Her most recent book is Nature’s Matrix: The Link between Agriculture, Conservation and Food Sovereignty.

More specifically we are investigating how local level multi-species interactions generate landscape level spatial pattern in the ant Azteca instabilis. We have established a 45-hectare plot in an shaded organic coffee plantation and are conducting research on the interactions between ants, their mutualistic scale insects, the natural enemies of the scale and a phorid fly that parasitizes the ant. The coffee project also includes the investigation of various ecosystem services, such as pest regulation and carbon sequestration.

Another research project examines the relationship between biodiversity and agricultural production.

More general interests include the role of the agricultural matrix in the conservation of biodiversity, sustainable development, and political ecology in the Global South, especially Latin America.

Awards and Grants:
"Spacial scaling with an unusual food web structure: the case of Azteca ants in the coffee agroecosystem." With my colleague, John Vandermeer, this project combines food web dynamics and spatial modelling to understand and predict the formation of a clumped distribution by the ant Azteca instabiles in coffee plantations in southern Mexico. Funded by NSF (2004-2008) "Matrix Quality and the Value of Biodiversity: Conservation of Bats in Neotropical Agroforestry Systems." With my colleague Kimberly Williams-Guillen we are examining the function of bats as predators of herbivores in coffee plantations unders verying management intensity. Funded by NSF (2006-2008) "Forest sucessional dynamics in the oak-dominated forests of the E. S. George Reserve: A spatially explicit approach." With my colleague John Vandermeer we are examining ecological sucession of an oak forest using spatially explicit models. Funded by the McIntire-Stennis (2007-2009)


Current/Recent Research:

* Spatial scaling with an unusual food web structure: the case of Azteca ants in the coffee agroecosystem.
* Effects of post agricultural succession on the assemblage of ants in the Atlantic Coast of Nicaragua.

* Biodiversity and aAgricultural Production (A distributed Seminar on Biodiversity)

* Matrix Quality and the Value of Biodiversity

Teaching Interests:
In my courses I like to challenge students to think for themselves. Most of my courses have a strong Latin American flavor because I am from Latin America (Puerto Rico) and I conduct research in Latin America (Mexico, Mesoamerica and Brazil). Most of my courses are interdisciplinary and are taught from a social justice perspective. I teach undergraduate courses in sustainable development and globalization, and the agroecology and political ecology of the food system, a graduate course in field ecology and graduate seminars on topics that range from conservation in fragmented habitats to biodiversity in agricultural systems.

Current/Recent Teaching:
In the fall term I teach Our Common Future: The Impacts of Globalization (ENVIRON 270 – not offer in fall 2011), General Ecology (ENVIRON/EEB 281), Field Ecology (SNRE 556), and graduate reading seminars. In the winter I teach Food, Land and Society (NRE 318) which has a three week field component at the end of the course in Cuba or Mexico.

Selected Publications (2008 to present):

• Tscharntke, T., Y. Clough, S. A. Bhagwat, H. Faust, D. Hertel, D. Hölscher, J. Juhrbandt, M. Kessler, I. Perfecto., G. Schroth, and E. Veldkamp. In press. Ecological principles of multifunctional shade-tree management in cacao agroforestry landscapes. Journal of Applied Ecology
• William-Guillén, K. and I. Perfecto. 2011. Insectivorous Bats Demonstrate Variable Responses to Agricultural Intensification in a Neotropical Agroforestry System. Submitted to PloS ONE 6: e16502.
• Perfecto, I., J. Vandermeer and S. M. Philpott. 2011. Complejidad ecológica y el control de plagas en un cafetal orgánico: develando un servicio ecosistémico autónomo. Agroecología 5: 41-51
• William-Guillén, K. and I. Perfecto. 2010 Effects of agricultural intensification on the assemblage of leaf-nosed bats (Phyllostomidae) in a coffee landscape in Chiapas, Mexico. Biotropica 42: 605-613
• Perfecto, I. and J. Vandermeer. 2010 The agricultural matrix as an alternative to the land-sparing/agricultural intensification model: facing the food and biodiversity crises. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 107:5786-5791.
• Vandermeer, J., I. Perfecto and S. M. Philpott. 2010. Ecological complexity and pest control in organic coffee production: uncovering an autonomous ecosystem service. BioScience 60: 527-537.
• Vandermeer, J., I. Perfecto and N. Schellhorn. 2010. Propagating sinks, ephemeral sources and percolating mosaics: Conservation in landscapes. Landscape Ecology 25: 509-518.
• Jha, S., J. Vandermeer, and I. Perfecto. 2009. Population dynamics of Coccus viridis, a ubiquitous ant-tended agricultural pest, assessed by a new photographic method. Bulletin of Insectology 62: 183-189.
• Ferguson, B. G. H. Morales, A. González Rojas, F. de Jesús Íñiguez Pérez, M. E. Martínez Torres, K. McAfee, R. Nigh, I. Perfecto, S. M. Philpott, L. Soto Pinto, J. Vandermeer, R. M. Vidal, L. E. Ávila Romero, H. Bernardino, R. Realpozo Reye. 2009. Soberania alimentaria: Cultivando nuevas alianzas entre campo, bosque y ciudad. Agroecología 4: 49-58. Also printed in: Altieri, M. A. (ed.) Vertientes del pensamiento agroecológico, Sociedad Científica Latinoamericana de Agroecología, Medellín, Colombia.
• Goulart, F., J. Vandermeer and I. Perfecto. 2009. Agroecologia na quebra de dois paradigmas modernos (Agroecological analysis of two modern paradigms). Revista Brasileira de Agroecologia 4: 76-85.
• Allen, D., J. Vandermeer and I. Perfecto. 2009. Are Islands really habitat Islands? Forest Ecology and Management 258: 2033-2036.
• Vandermeer, J., I. Perfecto, and H. Liere. 2009. Evidence for effective hyperparasitism on the coffee rust, Hemileia vastatrix, by the generalized insect pathogen, Lecanicillium (Verticillium) lecanii through a complex ecological web. Plant Pathology 58: 636-641
• Philpott SM, Perfecto I, Vandermeer J, Uno S. 2009. Spatial scale and density dependence in a host parasitoid system: an arboreal ant, Azteca instabilis and its Pseudacteon phorid parasitoid. Environmental Entomology 38: 790-796.
• Jackson, D., J. Vandermeer and I. Perfecto. 2009 Spatial and temporal dynamics of a fungal pathogen promotes pattern formation in a tropical agroecosystem. The Open Ecology Journal 2: 62-73.
• Gordon, C. E., B. McGill, G. Ibarra-Núñez, R. Greenberg, and I. Perfecto. 2009. Simplification of a coffee foliage-dwelling beetle community under low-shade management. Basic and Applied Ecology 10: 246-254.
• Chappell, M. J., J. Vandermeer, C. Badgley and I. Perfecto. 2009. Wildlife-friendly farming versus land sparing (Peer-reviewed letter). Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 7: 183.
• Philpott, S.M., W. J. Arendt, I. Armbrecht, P. Bichier, T. V. Diestch, C. Gordon, R. Greenberg, I. Perfecto, R. Reynoso-Santos, L. Soto-Pinto, C. Tejada-Cruz, G. Williams-Linera, J. Valenzuela, and S.M. Zolotoff. 2008. Biodiversity loss in Latin America coffee landscapes: review of the evidence on ants, birds and trees. Conservation Biology 22: 1093-1105.
• Lin, B. B.. I. Perfecto and J. Vandermeer. 2008. Synergies between agricultural intensification and climate change could create surprising vulnerabilities for crops. BioScience 58: 847-854.
• Perfecto, I. and J. Vandermeer. 2008a. Biodiversity conservation in tropical agroecosystems: A new paradigm. Annals of the New York Academy of Science, (The Year in Ecology and Conservation Biology 2008) 1134: 173-200.