Daijiang Li

Daijiang Li is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona. His research focuses on understanding biodiversity responses to global change through integrative approaches combining community ecology, phylogenetics, and statistical modeling. Previously, he held postdoctoral positions at the Florida Museum of Natural History and earned his PhD in Botany from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, with additional training in statistics and biometry.

Education:

• PhD, Botany, University of Wisconsin-Madison (2011-2016)
• MS, Biometry (Statistics), University of Wisconsin-Madison (2013-2016)
• MS, School of Life Science, Sun Yat-sen University (2008-2011)
• BA, School of Life Science, Yunnan University (2004-2008)

Research interests emphasize predicting biodiversity changes in urban and natural ecosystems using long-term datasets, big data analytics, and open-source software development. Key areas include plant phenology shifts, phylogenetic community structure, and invasion ecology. Major projects involve NEON data integration and phenology database development (PhenoBase).

Notable achievements include NSF funding for urban invasion studies, ESA Early Career Fellowship (2024), and impactful publications in Nature Ecology & Evolution and PNAS. His lab collaborates internationally on initiatives like the sGUBIK working group at iDiv and the Urban Eco-Evo Network.

Advising: Supervises graduate students and postdocs working on topics like deep learning for phenology analysis, nitrogen-fixing plant dynamics, and pollinator networks. Current lab members include Rohit Jha, Pablo Moreno, Evelin Reyes, and Nevyn Neal.

Labs/Teams: Leads the Li Lab at University of Arizona, transitioning from Louisiana State University. Active in open science initiatives, developing tools like PhenoVision and contributing to R packages (phyr, hillR, rr2).