Includes bibliographical references and index

Biodiversity dynamics: niche preemption and saturation in diversity equilibria / Michael L. McKinney -- Do taxa persist as metapopulations in evolutionary time? / Susan Harrison -- Geographic range fragmentation and the evolution of biological diversity / Brian A. Maurer and M. Philip Nott -- Detecting ecological pattern in phylogenies / J.L. Gittleman, C.G. Anderson, S.E. Cates, H-K. Luh, and J.D. Smith -- Testing models of speciation and extinction with phylogenetic trees of extant taxa / Jody Hey, Holly Hilton, Nicholas Leahy, and Rong-Lin Wang -- Dynamics of diversification in state space / Daniel W. McShea -- Diversification of body sizes: patterns and processes in the assembly of terrestrial mammal faunas / Douglas A. Kelt and James H. Brown -- The role of development in evolutionary radiations / Gunther J. Eble -- Evolutionary turnover and volatility in higher taxa / Norman L. Gilinski -- Scaling the ecosystem: a hierarchical view of stasis and change / Kenneth M. Schopf and Linda C. Ivany -- Nested patterns of species distribution: processes and implications / Alan H. Cutler -- Equilibrial diversity dynamics in North American mammals / John Alroy -- Scales of diversification and the Ordovician radiation / Arnold I. Miller and Shuguang Mao -- Preston's ergodic conjecture: the accumulation of species in space and time / Michael L. Rosenzweig -- An intermediate disturbance hypothesis of maximal speciation / Warren D. Allmon, Paul J. Morris, and Michael L. McKinney -- Turnover dynamics across ecological and geological scales / Gareth J. Russell -- Catastrophic fluctuations in nutrient levels as an agent of mass extinction: upward scaling of ecological processes? / Ronald E. Martin -- Scale-independent interpretations of macroevolutionary dynamics / Richard B. Aronson and Roy E. Plotnick

"How will patterns of human interaction with the earth's ecosystem impact biodiversity loss over the long term - not in the next ten or even fifty years, but on the vast temporal scale dealt with by earth scientists?"--BOOK JACKET. "The contributors to Biodiversity Dynamics bring together the cutting-edge findings of a number of different fields that have traditionally had little crossover: data from population biology, community ecology, comparative biology, and paleontology are all presented."--BOOK JACKET. "Where paleontologists and ecologists have long had divergent perspectives, Biodiversity Dynamics seeks a middle ground, finding ways for both scientific communities to work together to comprehend the great biodiversity of the earth and how to preserve it for future generations."--Jacket