Tackling multivariate analysis of ecological data in a new way…Thanks David!

In January SEEC hosted David Warton a Professor and Australian Research Council Future Fellow from the University of South Wales.

David champions the movement away from traditional methods of exploratory multivariate analyses to more predictive and testable model-based analyses in an effort to maintain the integrity of the data during analyses. To this end he has developed the mvabund R package.

While at UCT, David offered a model-based multivariate statistics course attended by 35 ecologists and statisticians from all over South Africa. This course challenged our thinking about popular multivariate methods and introduced new methodologies which will hopefully become more common in ecology. We have learned a lot and hope for many more future interactions with David and his students. Watch David’s recent Stats Department seminar HERE.