Current Research

My current research is focused on the assessment of conservation status in mammals and the analysis and monitoring of large-scale patterns and trends in biodiversity, primarily in the tropics. I was founding director of the Tropical Ecology, Assessment and Monitoring Network, based at Conservation International and currently under the direction of Dr. Sandy Andelman. This project is implementing standardized protocols for the monitoring of a variety of vegetation, climate and vertebrate indicators at field stations in the tropics. I am also involved in the Global Mammal Assessment, done in collaboration with the IUCN Species Survival Commission, which has evaluated the conservation status of all species of mammals in the world. Texas A&M University is also one of ten members of the Red List Partnership. At Texas A&M I have collaborated with Drs. Paulo Lima-Filho and Jay Walton of the Department of Mathematics on applications of mathematics to questions in ecology and conservation. Recent graduate student research includes mammalian community patterns along an altitudinal gradient in Mexico, morphological variation in Amazonian marmosets, spatial and temporal patterns of space and resource use of macaws in Peru, cultural values and conservation in the Iwokrama Forest region of Guyana, and assessment of biodiversity and ecosystem service value in the Big Bend-Carmen Corridor.

Teaching

WFSC 300/450/451/483 Dominica Field and Tropical Biology and WFSC 689 Applied Biodiversity Science I

Selected Publications

Books and Monographs

• Lacher, T.E., Jr. 1981. The comparative social behavior of Kerodon rupestris and Galea spixii and the evolution of behavior in the Caviidae.  Bulletin of the Carnegie Museum 17:1‑71.
• Kendall, R.J. and T.E. Lacher, Jr. (eds.). 1994. Wildlife Toxicology and Population Modeling: Integrated Studies of Agroecosystems. Lewis Publishers, Chelsea, MI, 576 pp.
• Savitsky, B.G. and T.E. Lacher, Jr. (eds.). 1998. GIS Methodologies for Developing Conservation Strategies: Tropical Forest Recovery and Wildlife Management in Costa Rica.  Columbia University Press, New York, 237pp.
• Kendall, R.J., T.E. Lacher, Jr., G.P. Cobb, and S.B. Cox (eds). 2010. Wildlife Toxicology: Emerging Contaminant and Biodiversity Issues. Taylor and Francis, Boca Raton, i-xviii + 321 pp.

Recent Papers and Book Chapters

• Fonseca, G.A.B., C. Gascon, M.K. Steininger, T. Brooks, R.A. Mittermeier and T.E. Lacher. Jr. 2002. A global fragmentation experiment underway. Science 295: 1835.
• Leal, I.R., J.M.C. da Silva, M. Tabarelli, and T.E. Lacher, Jr. 2005. Changing the course of biodiversity conservation in the Caatinga of Northeastern Brazil. Conservation Biology19:701-706.
• Weiser, M.D., B.J. Enquist, B. Boyle, T. Killeen, P. Jorgensen, G. Fonseca, M. Jennings, A.J. Kerkoff, T.E. Lacher, Jr., A. Monteaqudo, M.P. Nuñez-Vargas, O.L. Phillips, N.G. Swenson, and R. Vasquez. 2007. Latitudinal patterns of range size and species richness of New World woody plants. Global Ecology and Biogeography 16:679-688.
• Schipper, J. J. Chanson, F. Chiozza, N. Cox, M. Hoffmann, V. Katariya, J. Lamoreux, A. Rodrigues, S.N. Stuart, H.J. Temple, J. Baillie, L. Boitani, T.E. Lacher, Jr., R.A. Mittermeier, A.T. Smith, et al.. 2008. The status of the world’s land and marine mammals: diversity, threat, and knowledge. Science322:225-230.
• Castro-Arellano, I. and T.E. Lacher, Jr. 2009. Segregation by temporal niche in high and low richness rodent assemblages of subtropical Mexico. Journal of Tropical Ecology25:593-603.
• Aguiar, J.M. and T.E. Lacher, Jr. 2009. Cranial morphology of the dwarf marmoset Callibella in the context of callitrichid variability. Pp. 355-380, In: The Smallest Anthropoids: The Marmoset/Callimico Radiation, Susan M. Ford, Leila Porter, Lesa C. Davis, (eds.) Springer, New York.
• Lacher, T.E., Jr., J. Bickham, C. Gascon, R. Green, R.D. Moore, and M. Mora. 2010. Impacts of contaminants and pesticides on biodiversity and ecosystem structure and function. Pp. 109-143, In: Wildlife Toxicology: Emerging Contaminant and Biodiversity Issues. R.J. Kendall, T.E. Lacher, Jr., G.P. Cobb, and S.B. Cox (eds). Taylor and Francis, Boca Raton.
• Castro-Arellano, I. T.E. Lacher, Jr., M.R. Willig, and T. Rangel. 2010. Assessment of assemblage-wide temporal niche segregation using null models. Methods in Ecology and Evolution1:311-318.
• Lamoreux, J.F. and T.E. Lacher, Jr. 2010. Mammalian endemism, range size and conservation status in the southern temperate zones. Diversity and Distributions16:922-931.
• Hoffmann, M. et al. (Multiple authors from the Global Assessment Teams incl. T.E. Lacher, Jr.). 2010. The impact and shortfall of conservation on the status of the world’s vertebrates. Science330:1503-1509.
• Corso, A.E., J.B. Woolley, and T.E. Lacher, Jr. In press. Using digital photography to estimate the emergence of bats at Tou Santi Cave, Dominica, West Indies. Caribbean Journal of Science.