Brian Weeks

Brian Weeks is an Associate Professor in the School for Environment and Sustainability at the University of Michigan, where he joined as an Assistant Professor in 2019. His research focuses on understanding how species and communities respond to human-induced environmental changes, with particular emphasis on avian systems. Weeks leads an active research group that integrates museum specimen-based work, genomics, and field studies to investigate biodiversity responses to global change.

Weeks' research interests span evolutionary ecology, climate change biology, and biodiversity conservation. His work primarily examines how bird species and communities have responded to environmental change through morphological adaptations. He combines museum-, field-, and lab-based approaches to study evolutionary processes across multiple scales, from macroevolutionary patterns in the Solomon Islands to contemporary changes in North American migratory birds. His lab has developed innovative methods like Skelevision for high-throughput measurement of functional traits from museum skeletal specimens.

His publication record shows a strong focus on climate-driven morphological changes in birds, with recent work demonstrating how warming temperatures drive size reductions while simultaneously increasing wing length. His research has revealed that smaller-bodied species change at faster rates, and that migration timing shifts are decoupled from morphological changes. Weeks' lab also investigates biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relationships and extinction risk prediction.

• Packard Fellowship in Science and Engineering (2022)
• Ecological Society of America's George Mercer Award (2022)
• Katma Award, American Ornithological Society
• ISI Highly Cited paper (2021)

Weeks advises multiple PhD and Master's students, and his lab collaborates extensively with researchers across institutions. His work has received significant media attention, with coverage in Science, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, BBC News, and numerous international outlets. His research on birds shrinking due to climate change achieved an Altmetric score higher than 99.98% of papers tracked, reflecting its substantial scientific and public impact.