Tak attended the Annual Ecological Society of America (ESA) Meeting, held in New Orleans from 5th to 10th August. This is one of the biggest conferences in the field of Ecology, with thousands of attendants.

During the conference, Tak presented new work from our lab on the spatial scaling of relationships between species richness and productivity. The work involves using a neutral community model to make quantitative predictions on how these relationships change with increasing spatial scale. These predictions form a baseline against which to compare results from more complex models. Tak obtained valuable feedback during and after his presentation.

The conference was also a good opportunity for Tak to meet up with colleagues and collaborators. These included Nadav Shnerb from Bar-Ilan University, who is collaborating with us on the effects of temporal environmental variation on patterns of biodiversity in plant communities.