Daniel Pincheira-Donoso

Associate Professor of Evolutionary Biology & Global Change at Queen's University Belfast (UK). His research is concerned with the role of natural selection as the fundamental driver of evolutionary change that leads to the origin, adaptation and extinctions of species, with the aim of understanding the global organisation of biodiversity, its responses to climate change and the implementation of actions for their conservation. His publications have appeared in a range of leading scientific journals, and have received widespread attention from the media globally. He has also authored and participated in different books about zoology and evolutionary biology.

Daniel has been elected Fellow of the Linnean Society of London (2017), is a Fellow of the British Higher Education Academy (2012), and is the recipient of the 2018 Philippi Medal for Science and of a Honorary Fellowship (2021) both awarded by the National Museum of Natural History of Chile. Since 2019, he holds a Visiting Professorship in Evolutionary Biology at the Universidad de La Serena (Chile). He is an Associate Editor for Global Ecology and Biogeography.

Academic Career
Associate Professor, School of Biological Sciences, Queen's University, UK (2021-)
Lecturer, School of Biological Sciences, Queen's University, UK (2019-2021)
Lecturer/Senior Lecturer, School of Life Sciences, University of Lincoln, UK (2012-2018)
Leverhulme Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of Exeter, UK (2009-2012)
NERC Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Exeter, UK (2009)
NERC Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Exeter, UK (2008-2009)
PhD Evolutionary Biology, University of Exeter, UK (2005-2008)
Research Associate in Zoology, National Museum of Natural History, Chile (2003-2005)
BSc Biology (Summa Cum Laude), University of Concepcion, Chile (2003)

E-mail: [email protected]
Tel: +44(0)28 9097 2967
Departmental Website
Google Scholar Profile

Selected Recent Publications

Slavenko, A., Cooper, N., Pincheira-Donoso, D., Meiri, S. & Thomas, G. (2025). Evolution of sexual size dimorphism in tetrapods is driven by varying patterns of sex-specific selection on size. Nature Ecology & Evolution (In Press).

Cuthbert, R.N., Bodey, T.W., Briski, E., Capellini, I., Dick, J.T.A., Kourantidou, M., Ricciardi, A. & Pincheira-Donoso, D. (2025). Harnessing trait evolution to predict economic impacts from biological invasions. Trends in Ecology & Evolution (In Press).

[128] Carneiro, L., Leroy, B., Capinha, C., Bradshaw, C.J.A., Bertolino, S., Catford, J.A., Camacho, M., Bojko, J., Klippel, G., Kumschick, S., Pincheira-Donoso, D., Tonkin, J.D., Fath, B.D., South, J., Manfrini, E., Dallas, T. & Courchamp, F. (2025). Typology of the ecological impacts of biological invasions. Trends in Ecology & Evolution (In Press).

Haubrock, P. J., Soto, I..., Pincheira-Donoso, D... & Cuthbert, R.N. (2024). Biological invasions are a population-level rather than a species-level phenomenon. Global Change Biology, 30: e17312.

Soto, I., Balzani, P..., Pincheira-Donoso, D... & Haubrock, P. (2024). Taming the terminological tempest in invasion science. Biological Reviews, 99: 1357-1390.

Cuthbert, R.N., Dick, J.T.A., Haubrock, P.J., Pincheira-Donoso, D., Soto, I. & Briski, E. (2024). Economic impact disharmony in global biological invasions. Science of the Total Environment, 913: 169622. 
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Mi, Ch., Ma, L., Yang, M., Li, X., Meiri, S., Roll, U., Oskyrko, O., Pincheira-Donoso, D... & Liu, X. (2023). Global Protected Areas as refuges for amphibians and reptiles under climate change. Nature Communications, 14: 1389.

Finn, C., Grattarola, F. & Pincheira-Donoso, D. (2023). More losers than winners: Anthropocene defaunation through the diversity of population trends. Biological Reviews, 98: 1732-1748.

Pincheira-Donoso, D. & Hodgson, D.J. (2018). No evidence that extinction risk increases in the largest and smallest vertebrates. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 115, E5845-E5846.

Roll, U., Feldman, A., Novosolov, M., Allison, A., Bauer, A.M., Bernard, R., Böhm, M., Castro-Herrera, F., Chirio, L., Collen, B., Colli, G., Dabool, L., Das, I., Doan, T., Grismer, L., Hoogmoed, M., Itescu, Y., Kraus, F., LeBreton, M., Lewin, A., Martins, M., Maza, E., Meirte, D., Nagy, Z., Nogueira, C., Pauwels, O., Pincheira-Donoso, D., Powney, G., Sindaco, R., Tallowin, O., Torres-Carvajal, O., Trape, J., Vidan, E., Uetz, P., Wagner, P., Wang, Y., Orme, D., Grenyer, R. & Meiri, S. (2017). The global distribution of tetrapods reveals a need for targeted reptile conservation. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 1, 1677-1682.

Pincheira-Donoso, D. & Hunt, J. (2017). Fecundity selection theory: concepts and evidence. Biological Reviews, 92, 341-356.

School of Biological Sciences
Queen's University Belfast
19 Chlorine Gardens, Belfast
BT9 5DL, United Kingdom
e-mail: [email protected]