OxTalks will soon move to the new Halo platform and will become 'Oxford Events.' There will be a need for an OxTalks freeze. This was previously planned for Friday 14th November – a new date will be shared as soon as it is available (full details will be available on the Staff Gateway).
In the meantime, the OxTalks site will remain active and events will continue to be published.
If staff have any questions about the Oxford Events launch, please contact halo@digital.ox.ac.uk
Widespread in nature, mutualistic associations –cooperative interactions between unrelated species– are linked to major evolutionary transitions, and are pivotal for ecosystem functioning. The evolution and subsequent stability of mutualisms has long been a riddle: while they are thought to be prone to breakdown, some have persisted for millions of years. In this talk, I will focus on mutualistic dependence – the degree to which a partner is dependent on the interaction for survival or reproduction. Drawing from examples from my research using ant/plant symbioses, I will ask how highly vs. lowly dependent mutualisms maximise returns from their partners and deal with associated trade-offs.
