Dr Tom Matthews DPhil, AFHEA

Dr Tom Matthews

School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences
Senior Research Fellow / Senior Lecturer

Contact details

Telephone
+44 (0)121 415 8388
Email
t.j.matthews@bham.ac.uk
View my research portal
Address
School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Tom Matthews is a Senior Research Fellow who researches global environmental change issues using macroecological, macroevolutionary and biogeographical approaches. He applies a mixture of theoretical and empirical methods to investigate various macroecological topics. He has a keen interest in island systems and birds, and has published two recent books on species–area relationships (Cambridge Uni. Press) and island biogeography (Oxford Uni. Press).

His research also aims to provide information of use in biodiversity conservation in island systems and fragmented landscapes, and a number of his papers are focused on conservation biogeography issues. His most recent project is focused on the impact of human-driven species extinctions and introductions on island ecosystem functioning and functional diversity.

Qualifications

  • DPhil – University of Oxford
  • MSc – University of Oxford (Distinction)
  • BSc (Hons) – University of Birmingham (First)
  • Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

Biography

Tom completed his BSc at the University of Birmingham in 2009, before undertaking a year as a researcher at Birmingham focusing on urban ecology under the supervision of Professor Jon Sadler. He then progressed to study an MSc and DPhil at Oxford University under the supervision of Professor Rob Whittaker. His DPhil was entitled: 'analysing, modelling and mitigating the impact of habitat destruction and fragmentation on species diversity: a macroecological perspective.' During his time at Oxford he won numerous awards for his research, including a NERC scholarship, two Royal Geographical Society Awards, and the University of Oxford’s Vice Chancellor’s Award. He joined the University of Birmingham as a Birmingham Fellow in 2016 and currently leads a research group focused on a range of macroecological, biogeographical and conservation topics. He has published over 80 journal articles, two books and three software packages in these fields.

Teaching

Tom currently has second and fourth year tutorial groups, two dissertation supervision groups, and teaches on the following undergraduate modules:

  • Statistical Methods and Tutorials (Year 1)
  • Statistics and applied GIS (Year 1)
  • Environmental Research Frontiers (Year 1)
  • Ecological Systems (Year 2)
  • Conservation into practice (Year 3)

Postgraduate supervision

Qualified and motivated graduate students with similar research interests are welcome to email me. In particular, I am looking for PhD students interested in macroecology/biogeography questions related to different types of species diversity: taxonomic, functional and phylogenetic. I am also interested in supervising students with interests in island biogeography, functional island biogeography, and the study of global environmental change (e.g. habitat loss, climate change, invasive species) on islands.

Current Doctoral Researchers

Lead supervisor

Yating Song (2018 – present) The impact of urbanisation on carnivore species

Joseph Wayman (2018 – present) Holistic approach to global environmental change research

Eva Benavides-Ríos (2021 – present) Island macroecology and the conservation of island biodiversity

Maria Jørgensen (2022 - present) Island biogeography of avian extinctions and introductions

Osanna Chu (2023 - present) Predicting functional diversity loss across islands for plants and birds

Co-supervisor

Imogen Mansfield (2018 – present) Indicators of air pollution-derived stress in birds

Sijeh Asuk (2018 – present) Phenological responses of food producing forest trees to climate change

Aaron Bhambra (2021 - present) Habitat fragmentation and heathland pollinators

Greg Eckhartt (2022 - present) Do wooded networks enhance bird movement in urban areas?

Estelle Darko (2022 - present) Forest Diversity, Dynamics and Resilience in a changing world

Rachel Mailes (2023 - present) Tropical foreast biodiversity and carbon sequestration


Completed students

Thomas Aspin (2016 – 2018) Drought impacts on stream ecosystems
Eva Loza Vega (2017 – 2020) Long term changes in macroinvertebrate communities in streams of Denali National Park, Alaska
Zining Whang (2017 – 2020) Drought impacts on stream ecosystems.
Victoria Pattison-Willits (2019 – 2023) Avian productivity, urbanization and climatic extremes
Ye Li (2017 – 2023) The island biogeography of urban ecosystems.

Research

Tom Matthews is a Senior Research Fellow who researches global environmental change issues using macroecological, macroevolutionary and biogeographical approaches. He applies a mixture of theoretical and empirical methods to investigate various macroecological topics. He has a keen interest in island systems and birds, and has published two recent books on species–area relationships (Cambridge Uni. Press) and island biogeography (Oxford Uni. Press).

His research also aims to provide information of use in biodiversity conservation in island systems and fragmented landscapes, and a number of his papers are focused on conservation biogeography issues. His most recent project is focused on the impact of human-driven species extinctions and introductions on island ecosystem functioning and functional diversity.

Google scholar profile: https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=jLhtK7QAAAAJ&hl=en 

Research Gate profile: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tom_Matthews5

 

Other activities

  • Associate Researcher in the Biodiversity Research Group, University of the Azores.
  • Visiting Researcher to the Faculty of Science, University of the Ryukyus, Japan
  • Member of the Global Endemism and GrassPlot research working group
  • Associate Editor of the journals Journal of Biogeography and Frontiers of Biogeography
  • Member of the British Ecological Society, the International Biogeography Society, the Society for Island Biology, and the Royal Geographical Society

Publications

Recent publications

Article

BioTIME consortium 2025, 'BioTIME 2.0: Expanding and Improving a Database of Biodiversity Time Series', Global Ecology and Biogeography, vol. 34, no. 5, e70003. https://doi.org/10.1111/geb.70003

Zeng, D, Matthews, TJ, Wang, R, Zhao, Y, Yan, C, Ding, P & Si, X 2025, 'Defaunation erodes the diversity of rodent personality traits in fragmented forests', Journal of Animal Ecology, vol. 94, no. 10, pp. 2047-2061. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.70105

Valle, S, Pereira, D, Matthews, T & Martin, TE 2025, 'Heightened extinction risk due to tropical cyclones in insular biodiversity hotspots', Biological Conservation, vol. 307, 111184. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2025.111184

Asuk, SA, Wayman, JP, Sadler, JP, Pugh, TAM, Matthews, TJ, Ebu, VT, Phillips, OL, Lewis, S, Sonké, B, Talbot, J, Comiskey, J, Zemagho, L, Ojo, L, Begne, S, Taedoumg, H, Sunderland, T, Hubau, W, Droissart, V, Qie, L, Gilpin, M, Simo-Droissart, M, Feldpausch, T, Peh, KSH, Banin, LF, Kamdem, MND & Kettridge, N 2025, 'Human and Environmental Factors Shape Tree Species Assemblages in West African Tropical Forests', Diversity and Distributions, vol. 31, no. 8, e70075. https://doi.org/10.1111/ddi.70075

Zhao, Y, Zeng, D, Matthews, TJ, Craven, D, Tingley, MW, Wang, S, Li, S, Ding, P & Si, X 2025, 'Island biogeography and life-history traits stabilize island bird communities', Global Change Biology, vol. 31, no. 10, e70535. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.70535

Ulrich, W, Matthews, TJ, Biurrun, I, Aleksanyan, A, Borovyk, D, Burrascano, S, Campos, JA, Chusova, O, Czarniecka‐Wiera, M, Czortek, P, Dembicz, I, Essl, F, Janišová, M, Labadessa, R, Napoleone, F, Pielech, R, Vynokurov, D & Puchałka, R 2025, 'The proper middle class: assessing the importance of subordinate species on plant community assembly and functional diversity', Oikos. https://doi.org/10.1002/oik.11572

Dias, RA, Bastazini, VAG, Gianuca, AT & Matthews, TJ 2025, 'The spatial scaling of multiple dimensions of functional diversity in habitat islands', Functional Ecology. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2435.70158

Guillerme, T, Cardoso, P, Jørgensen, MW, Mammola, S & Matthews, T 2025, 'The what, how, and why of trait-based analyses in ecology', Ecography. https://doi.org/10.1111/ecog.07580

Sayol, F, Wayman, JP, Dufour, P, Martin, TE, Hume, JP, Jørgensen, MW, Maru, N, Sanglas, A, Soares, F, Cooke, R, Mendenhall, C, Margolis, J, Illera, JC, Lemoine, R, Benavides Rios, E, Lapiedra, O, Triantis, K, Pigot, AL, Tobias, JA, Faurby, S & Matthews, T 2024, 'AVOTREX: a global dataset of extinct birds and their traits', Global Ecology and Biogeography. https://doi.org/10.1111/geb.13927

Cardoso, P, Guillerme, T, Mammola, S, Matthews, T, Rigal, F, Graco-Roza, C, Stahls, G & Carvalho, JC 2024, 'Calculating functional diversity metrics using neighbor-joining trees', Ecography. https://doi.org/10.1111/ecog.07156

Zhao, Y, Mendenhall, C, Matthews, T, Wang, D, Li, W, Liu, X, Tang, S, Han, P, Wei, G, Kang, Y, Wu, C, Wang, R, Zeng, D, Frishkoff, LO & Si, X 2024, 'Land-use change interacts with island biogeography to alter bird community assembly', Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, vol. 291, no. 2018, 20232245. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2023.2245

Liu, D, Esquivel-Muelbert, A, Acil, N, Astigarraga, J, Cienciala, E, Fridman, J, Kunstler, G, Matthews, TJ, Ruiz-Benito, P, Sadler, JP, Schelhaas, M-J, Suvanto, S, Talarczyk, A, Woodall, CW, Zavala, MA, Zhang, C & Pugh, T 2024, 'Mapping multi-dimensional variability in water stress strategies across temperate forests', Nature Communications, vol. 15, no. 1, 8909. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-53160-1

Other contribution

Pereira, D, Matthews, T, Valle, S & Martin, T 2025, Weatherwatch: How 60 species are just one cyclone away from extinction: Hurricane Dorian killed off the Bahama nuthatch and more biodiversity hotspots are at risk from extreme weather.. <https://www.theguardian.com/news/2025/jun/04/weatherwatch-how-60-species-are-just-one-cyclone-away-from-extinction#:~:text=Now%20a%20new%20study%20reveals,away%20from%20being%20wiped%20out.>

Review article

Ulrich, W, Borges, PAV, Fattorini, S, ter Steege, H, Gotelli, NJ, Magurran, AE, Marquet, PA, Schrader, J & Matthews, TJ 2025, 'Species and trait abundance distributions as tools for understanding disturbance effects and community assembly in applied ecology', Journal of Applied Ecology, vol. 62, no. 9, pp. 2096-2110. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.70140

Mansfield, I, Reynolds, SJ, Lynch, I, Matthews, TJ & Sadler, JP 2024, 'Birds as bioindicators of plastic pollution in terrestrial and freshwater environments: A 30-year review', Environmental Pollution, vol. 348, 123790. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2024.123790

View all publications in research portal