About

Vadim Karatayev is an Assistant Professor of Biology in the Department of Biology at the University of Maryland. His research combines theory and large-scale field data to understand the conditions that erode or reinforce resilience in complex ecosystems. His work explores fundamental questions at the interface of community ecology, landscape ecology, and network dynamics. Karatayev has contributed to understanding spatial synchrony in ecosystems, climate change impacts on marine ecosystems, and the effects of habitat loss and invasive species on freshwater invertebrates. His research also addresses ecological stability, community states, and the influence of behavior and resource subsidies across ecosystem boundaries.

Research topics

• Psychology
• Biology
• Geography
• Ecology
• Medical education
• Fishery
• Engineering
• Social psychology
• Engineering ethics
• Medicine
• Pedagogy

Selected publications

• Multiple invasions decimate the most imperiled freshwater invertebrates

  Repository for Publications and Research Data (ETH Zurich) · 2025-01-01

  otherOpen access
  PublisherDOI

• Insights Into Spatial Synchrony Enabled by Long‐Term Data

  Ecology Letters · 2025-04-01 · 10 citations

  reviewOpen access

  Spatial synchrony, the tendency for temporal fluctuations in an ecological variable to be positively associated in different locations, is a widespread and important phenomenon in ecology. Understanding of the nature and mechanisms of synchrony, and how synchrony is changing, has developed rapidly over the past 2 decades. Many recent developments have taken place through the study of long-term data sets. Here, we review and synthesise some important recent advances in spatial synchrony, with a focus on how long-term data have facilitated new understanding. Longer time series do not just facilitate better testing of existing ideas or more precise statistical results; more importantly, they also frequently make possible the expansion of conceptual paradigms. We discuss several such advances in our understanding of synchrony, how long-term data led to these advances, and how future studies can continue to improve the state of knowledge.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Multiple invasions decimate the most imperiled freshwater invertebrates

  Biological Invasions · 2025-02-01 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access

  Invaders can have devastating impacts on freshwater ecosystems, but these impacts can subside over time as ecosystems "adapt" to the invasion of new species. We analyzed changes in species composition and density of molluscs in Oneida Lake (New York, USA), one of the best studied North American lakes based on detailed surveys conducted in 1915-17, 1967-68, 1992-95, 2012, and 2022-23, and on annual benthic surveys from 2009 through 2023. Eutrophication and habitat alteration after 1920 resulted in a 25% decline in species richness and a 95% decline in the density of native gastropods by 1967, while species richness of unionids did not change. The arrival of zebra mussels in 1991 and quagga mussels in 2005 was associated with an increase in species richness and density of native gastropods and an extirpation of unionids by 1995. However, an invasion by the round goby in 2013 led to a significant decline across all gastropod families, disproportionately impacting soft-shelled and shallow-dwelling species, while other species, including invasive dreissenids, partially recovered 3-7 years after the goby invasion. This mollusc recovery was depth-related and was limited to deeper areas. Altogether, molluscan communities were sensitive to ecosystem change and invasives species, with some invaders offsetting the impacts of eutrophication and habitat alterations. While individual stressors have taxon-specific and sometimes positive impacts, eutrophication and species invasions have collectively decimated the native mollusc community over the past century. Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10530-025-03540-5.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Impact of population behavioural responses on the critical community size of infectious diseases

  Theoretical Ecology · 2024-07-12

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Insights into spatial synchrony enabled by long-term data

  2024-07-10 · 1 citations

  preprint

  Spatial synchrony, the tendency for temporal fluctuations in an ecological variable to be positively associated in different locations, is a widespread and important phenomenon in ecology. Understanding of the nature and mechanisms of synchrony, and how synchrony is changing, has developed rapidly over the past two decades. Many recent developments have taken place through the study of long-term datasets. Here, we review and synthesize some important recent advances in spatial synchrony, with a focus on how long-term data have facilitated new understanding. Longer time series do not just facilitate better testing of existing ideas or more precise statistical results; more importantly, they also frequently make possible the expansion of conceptual paradigms. We discuss several such advances in our understanding of synchrony, how long-term data led to these advances, and how future studies can continue to improve the state of knowledge.

  PublisherDOI

• Climate change could amplify weak synchrony in large marine ecosystems

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2024-12-30 · 4 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Climate change is increasing the frequency of large-scale, extreme environmental events and flattening environmental gradients. Whether such changes will cause spatially synchronous, large-scale population declines depends on mechanisms that limit metapopulation synchrony, thereby promoting rescue effects and stability. Using long-term data and empirical dynamic models, we quantified spatial heterogeneity in density dependence, spatial heterogeneity in environmental responses, and environmental gradients to assess their role in inhibiting synchrony across 36 marine fish and invertebrate species. Overall, spatial heterogeneity in population dynamics was as important as environmental drivers in explaining population variation. This heterogeneity leads to weak synchrony in the California Current Ecosystem, where populations exhibit diverse responses to shared, large-scale environmental change. In contrast, in the Northeast U.S. Shelf Ecosystem, gradients in average environmental conditions among locations, filtered through nonlinear environmental response curves, limit synchrony. Simulations predict that environmental gradients and response diversity will continue to inhibit synchrony even if large-scale environmental extremes become common. However, if environmental gradients weaken, synchrony and periods of large-scale population decline may rise sharply among commercially important species on the Northeast Shelf. Our approach thus allows ecologists to 1) quantify how differences among local communities underpin landscape-scale resilience and 2) identify the kinds of future climatic changes most likely to amplify synchrony and erode species stability.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Voralpine Seen und Trinkwasserversorgung durch Muscheln bedroht

  wwt Wasserwirtschaft Wassertechnik · 2024-01-01

  article

  Die Quaggamuschel wurde 2015 erstmalig im Genfersee nachgewiesen. Seitdem hat sich diese ursprünglich aus dem Dnepr stammende invasive Art in den voralpinen Seen rasant ausgebreitet. Was bedeutet das für die Ökosysteme und die regionale Wasserversorgung?

  PublisherDOI

• Spatial synchrony cascades across ecosystem boundaries and up food webs via resource subsidies

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2024-01-02 · 19 citations

  articleOpen access

  Cross-ecosystem subsidies are critical to ecosystem structure and function, especially in recipient ecosystems where they are the primary source of organic matter to the food web. Subsidies are indicative of processes connecting ecosystems and can couple ecological dynamics across system boundaries. However, the degree to which such flows can induce cross-ecosystem cascades of spatial synchrony, the tendency for system fluctuations to be correlated across locations, is not well understood. Synchrony has destabilizing effects on ecosystems, adding to the importance of understanding spatiotemporal patterns of synchrony transmission. In order to understand whether and how spatial synchrony cascades across the marine-terrestrial boundary via resource subsidies, we studied the relationship between giant kelp forests on rocky nearshore reefs and sandy beach ecosystems that receive resource subsidies in the form of kelp wrack (detritus). We found that synchrony cascades from rocky reefs to sandy beaches, with spatiotemporal patterns mediated by fluctuations in live kelp biomass, wave action, and beach width. Moreover, wrack deposition synchronized local abundances of shorebirds that move among beaches seeking to forage on wrack-associated invertebrates, demonstrating that synchrony due to subsidies propagates across trophic levels in the recipient ecosystem. Synchronizing resource subsidies likely play an underappreciated role in the spatiotemporal structure, functioning, and stability of ecosystems.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• An abundant future for quagga mussels in deep European lakes

  bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2023-06-04 · 4 citations

  preprintOpen access

  Abstract Quagga mussels have expanded their range across the northern hemisphere in recent decades owing to their dispersal abilities, prolific reproduction rates, and broad ecological tolerances. Their remarkable capacity to filter particulates from the water column has had profound effects on inland aquatic ecosystems. In the North American Great Lakes, quagga mussel populations have increased inexorably since the late 1980’s, but it remains unclear whether quagga mussels will follow a similar trajectory in Europe where they have appeared more recently. Here we apply knowledge from a 33-year quagga population monitoring effort in the North American lakes to predict future quagga populations in deep European lakes, where quaggas are quickly becoming a conspicuous part of the underwater landscape. We predict that quagga mussel biomass in Lakes Biel, Constance, and Geneva may increase by a factor of 9 – 20 by 2045. Like in North America, this increase may be characterized by a shift to larger individuals and deeper depths as the population matures. If realized, this rapid expansion of quagga mussels would likely drive the largest aquatic ecosystem change in deep European lakes since the eutrophication period of the mid-20 th century.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• An abundant future for quagga mussels in deep European lakes

  Environmental Research Letters · 2023-11-07 · 8 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Quagga mussels have expanded their range across the northern hemisphere in recent decades owing to their dispersal abilities, prolific reproduction rates, and broad ecological tolerances. Their remarkable capacity to filter particulates from the water column has had profound effects on inland aquatic ecosystems. In the North American Great Lakes, quagga mussel populations have increased inexorably since the late 1980’s, but it remains unclear whether quagga mussels will follow a similar trajectory in Europe where they have appeared more recently. Here we apply knowledge from a long-term quagga population monitoring effort in the North American lakes to predict future quagga populations in deep European lakes, where quaggas are quickly becoming a conspicuous part of the underwater landscape. We predict that quagga mussel biomass in Lakes Biel, Constance, and Geneva may increase by a factor of 9–20 by 2045. Like in North America, this increase may be characterized by a shift to larger individuals and deeper depths as the population matures. If realized, this rapid expansion of quagga mussels would likely drive the largest aquatic ecosystem change in deep European lakes since the eutrophication period of the mid-20th century.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• OCE-PRF: Uncovering the drivers of marine metapopulation synchrony and resilience under climate change

  NSF · $319k · 2022–2025

Frequent coauthors

• Lyubov E. Burlakova

  Buffalo State University

  39 shared

• Alexander Y. Karatayev

  33 shared

• Madhur Anand

  9 shared

• Chris T. Bauch

  University of Waterloo

  9 shared

• Clifford E. Kraft

  Cornell University

  8 shared

• Stephan B. Munch

  8 shared

• Elise F. Zipkin

  Michigan State University

  6 shared

• Marissa L. Baskett

  University of California, Davis

  6 shared

Labs

• Vadim Karatayev LabPI

Education

• PhD, Environmental Science and Policy

  University of California Davis

  2019