When we try to pick out anything by itself we find that it is bound fast by a thousand invisible cords that cannot be broken, to everything in the universe. — John Muir

I study range limits and the ecological and evolutionary dynamics of species interactions.

I’m currently a fifth year PhD candidate at the University of Minnesota, doing most of my work with the California endemic wildflower, Clarkia xantiana ssp. xantiana (pictured at top). Check out the links above to find out more about my research and extracurricular interests, and the talk below for a 5 minute synopsis of some of the questions I’m asking. See the field notes section for blog posts about natural history phenomena, my own research, and cool work others are doing.

Trapped! A SoCal species border from John Benning on Vimeo. Captions available.