Skip directly to: Navigation for this section | Main page content
Todd Lab Herpetolgy and Wildlife Conservation

About Brian

Dr. Todd with a desert tortoise in the Mojave National Preserve

Brian's Long-form CV (updated March 2022)


Brian's Google Scholar Citations Page and H-index


I am interested in understanding the factors that affect the distribution, abundance, and persistence of wildlife populations. My work primarily focuses on the ecology and conservation of reptiles and amphibians but my motivation is to shed light on the broader conservation questions that ultimately affect all forms of wildlife and the environments in which they live. Consequently, much of my research focuses on several fundamental factors that lead to the imperilment of species and populations.

I generally conduct research with the goal of answering questions about the ways in which wildlife respond to a world that is rapidly changing due to anthropogenic factors like habitat loss or degradation, climate change, and the introduction of invasive species or novel pathogens.


Examples of Recent Publications


Todd BD, Nowakowski AJ. 2020. Ectothermy and the macroecology of home range scaling in snakes. Global Ecology and Biogeography 30:262–276.

Nowakowski AJ, Frishkoff LA, Thompson ME, Smith TM, Todd BD. 2018. Phylogenetic homogenization of amphibian assemblages in human-altered habitats across the globe. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 115:E3454–E3462.

Todd BD, Nowakowski AJ, Rose JP, Price SJ. 2017. Species traits explaining sensitivity of snakes to human land use estimated from citizen science data. Biological Conservation 206:31–36.

Nowakowski AJ, Whitfield SM, Eskew EA, Thompson ME, Rose JP, Kerby JL, Donnelly MA, Todd BD. 2016. Infection risk decreases with increasing mismatch in host and pathogen environmental tolerances. Ecology Letters 19:1051–1064.