About us
We are a group of entomologists and forest ecologists interested to understand the main factors that affect the local maintenance of arthropod biodiversity in tropical rainforests. Our research program has several components. We have studied canopy arthropods, insect-plant interactions and herbivore interaction networks in tropical rainforests. However, we are now increasingly focusing on the threats to tropical insects induced by global climate change and climate anomalies. To this end, we built a small network of forest sites recruiting from the ForestGEO network (notably in Panama, Thailand and Papua New Guinea), where we are monitoring in the long-term various insect taxa, from butterflies to termites. We apply new analytical and molecular methods to forecast how climate change may alter key functional groups represented by insect taxa with diverse life-histories.
Recent selected publications
2026
García-Ruilova, A.B., Donoso, D.A., Basset, Y., Carrión-Olmedo, J.C., Garcés-Carrera, S., Jarrín-V, P., Muñoz-Tobar, S.I, Padhye, S., Perez, K.H.J., Quiñónez-Sánchez, D., Sanchéz, P., Janzen, D.H., Hallwachs, W., Inclán, D.J.. 2026. Barcoding megadiversity: an arthropod database from sites in the Neotropical Eastern Pacific bioregion. Scientific Data, in press.
2025
Wyckhuys, K.A.G., Basset, Y., Lewis, O.T. 2025. Insect biodiversity monitoring must be expanded. Nature, 646, 288.
Chen, Y., Lang, N., Schmidt, B. C., Jain, A., Basset, Y., Beery, S., … & Rolnick, D. 2025. Open-Set Recognition of Novel Species in Biodiversity Monitoring. Proceedings of the Thirty-Ninth Annual Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems, in press.
Yau, E.Y.H., Jones, E.E. Tsang, T.P.N, Xing, S., Corlett, R.T., …, Basset, Y., … & Bonebrake, T.C. 2025. Spatial occurrence records and distributions of tropical Asian butterflies. Scientific Data, 12, 1004.
Souto-Vilarós, D., Navarro-Valencia, E., Zamora, A.C., Campusano, Y., Lamarre, G.P.A., Perez, F., Lopez, Y., Bobadilla, R., Ramírez Silva, J.A., Janda4, M., deWaard, J.R., Leponce, M., Barrios, H. & Basset, Y. 2025. Navigating the seven seas of arthropod collection protocols: Metabarcoding arthropod diversity in a tropical forest. Methods in Ecology and Evolution, 16, 2395-2407.
Basset, Y., Lamarre, G.P.A., Donoso, D.A., Souto-Vilarós, D., Perez, F., Bobadilla, R., Lopez, Y., Ramírez Silva, J.A. & Barrios, H. 2025. The magnitude of cryptic insect diversity in one tropical rainforest. Insect Conservation and Diversity, 18, 1163-1174.
Lamarre, G.P.A., Muller-Landau, H.C. & Basset, Y. 2025. Long-term monitoring of butterflies on Barro Colorado Island highlights the value of small conservation preserves for tropical insects. In: The First 100 Years of Research on Barro Colorado: Animal Ecology, Evolution and Behavior (eds W.T. Wcislo, A. Aiello & R.A. Page), in press. Smithsonian Institution Scholarly Press, Washington DC.
Wenda, C., Luk, C.-L., Benedick, S., Nakamura, A., Basset, Y., Bonebrake, T.C., Scheffers, B.R., Ashton, L.A., Xing, S. 2025. Butterflies respond to habitat disturbance in tropical forests through activity shifts. Journal of Animal Ecology, 94, 1361–1371.
Morey, V., Lahn, E., Elton, C., Ibáñez, A., Basset, Y. & Francisco-Ortega, J. 2025. David Fairchild as a naturalist and advocate for tropical biology research: his 1924 trip to Panama. Webbia. Journal of Plant Taxonomy and Geography, 80, 15-41.
Tsang, T.P.N., De Santis, A.A.A., Armas-Quiñonez, G., Ascher, J.S., Ávila-Gómez, E.S., Báldi, A., Ballare, K.M., Balzan, M.V., Banaszak-Cibicka, W., Bänsch, S., Basset, Y., …, & Bonebrake, T.C. 2024. Land use change consistently reduces α but not β and γ diversity of bees. Global Change Biology, 31, e70006.
Uquillas, A., Bonilla, N., Arizala, S., Basset, Y., Barrios, B. & Donoso, D.A. 2025. Climate drives the long-term reproductive investment in a tropical ant community. Scientific Reports, 15, 428.
2024
Bonadies, E., Lamarre, G.P.A., Souto-Vilarós, D., Pardikes, N.A., Ramírez Silva, J.A., Perez, F., Bobadilla, R., Lopez, Y. & Basset, Y. 2024. Population trends of insect pollinators in a species-rich tropical rainforest: stable trends but contrasting patterns across taxa. Biology Letters, 20, 20240170.
Leponce, M., Basset, Y., Aristizábal-Botero, Á., Baïben, N., Barbut, J., Buyck, B., Butterill, P., Calders, K., Cárdenas, G., Carrias, J.-F., Catchpole, D., D’hont, B., Delabie, J., Drescher, J., Ertz, D., Heughebaert, A., Hofstetter, V., Leroy, C., Melki, F., Michaux, J., Neita-Moreno, J.C., Poirier, E., Rougerie, R., Rouhan, G., Rufray, V., Scheu, S., Schmidl, J., Vanderpoorten, A., Villemant, C., Youdjou, N. & Pascal, O. 2024. Unveiling the above-ground eukaryotic diversity supported by individual large old trees: the “Life on Trees” integrative protocol. Frontiers in Forests and Global Change, 7, 1425492.
Jain, A., Cunha, F., Bunsen, M.J., Cañas, J.S., Pasi, L., Pinoy, N., Helsing, F., Russo, J., Botham, M., Sabourin, M., Fréchette, J., Anctil, A., Lopez, Y., Navarro, E., Perez Pimentel, F., Zamora, A.C., Ramirez Silva, J.A., Gagnon, J., August, T., Bjerge, K., Gomez Segura, A., Bélisle, M., Basset, Y., McFarland, K.P., Roy, D., Høye, T.T., Larrivée, M., Rolnick, D. 2024. Insect identification in the wild: The AMI dataset. Proceedings of the European Conference on Computer Vision, Milano, 2024, in press.
2023
Souto-Vilarós, D., Basset, Y., Blažek, P., Laird-Hopkins, B., Segar, S.T., Navarro-Valencia, E., Cecilia Zamora, A., Campusano, Y., Čtvrtečka, R., Savage, A.F., Perez, F., Lopez, Y., Bobadilla, R., Ramírez Silva, J.A. & Lamarre, G.P.A. 2024. Illuminating arthropod diversity in a tropical forest: Assessing biodiversity by automatic light trapping and DNA metabarcoding. Environmental DNA, DOI: 10.1002/edn3.540
Segar, S.T., Re Jorge, L., Nicholls, L., Basset, Y., Rota, J., Kaman, O., Sisol, M., Gewa, B., Dahl, C., Butterill, P., Mezzomo, P., Miller, S.E., Weiblen, G., Salminen, J.-P., Novotny, V. & Volf, M. 2024. Species swarms and their caterpillar colonisers: phylogeny and polyphenols determine host plant specificity in New Guinean Lepidoptera. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 11, 1308608.
August, T., Basset, Y., Boislard, T., Gomez-Segura, A., Høye, T. T., … & Roy, D. B. 2023. Automated monitoring of biodiversity in the tropics: A pilot study at Barro Colorado Island (1.0) [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7598393
Ashe-Jepson, E., Arizala Cobo, S., Basset, Y., Bladon, A.J., Kleckova, I., Laird-Hopkins, B.C., Mcfarlane, A., Sam, K., Savage, A.F., Zamora, A.C., Turner, E.C. & Lamarre, G.P.A. 2023. Tropical butterflies use thermal buffering and thermal tolerance as alternative strategies to cope with temperature increase. Journal of Animal Ecology, doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.13970.
Laird-Hopkins, B. C, Ashe-Jepson, E., Basset, Y., Cobo, S. A., Eberhardt, L., Freiberga, I., Hellon, J., Hitchcock, G.W., Kleckova, I., Linke, D., Lamarre, G.P.A., McFarlane, A., Savage, A.F., Turner, E.C., Zamora, A.C., Sam, K. & Bladon, A. J. 2023. Thermoregulatory ability and mechanism do not differ consistently between neotropical and temperate butterflies. Global Change Biology, 29, 4180-4192.
Basset, Y., Butterill, P.T., , Donoso, D.A., Lamarre, G.P.A., Souto-Vilaros, D., Perez, F., Bobadilla, R., Lopez, Y., Ramírez Silva, J.A. & Barrios, H. (2023) Abundance, occurrence and time series: long-term monitoring of social insects in a tropical rainforest. Ecological Indicators, 150, 110243.
2022
Harvey, J.A., Tougeron, K., Gols, R., …, Basset, Y., … & Chown, S.L. 2022. Scientists’ warning on climate change and insects. Ecological Monographs, in press.
Basset, Y., Blažek, P., Souto-Vilarós, D., Vargas, G., Ramírez Silva, J.A., Barrios, H., Perez, F., Bobadilla, R., Lopez, Y., Ctvrtecka, R., Šípek, P., Solís, A., Segar, S.T. & Lamarre, G.P.A. 2022. Towards a functional classification of poorly known tropical insects: The case of rhinoceros beetles (Coleoptera, Dynastinae) in Panama. Insect Conservation and Diversity, in press.
Basset, Y., Hajibabaei, M., Wright, M.T.G., Castillo, A.M., Donoso, D.A., Segar, S.T., Souto‑Vilarós, D. Soliman, D.Y., Roslin, T., Smith, M.A., Lamarre, G.P.A., De León, L.F., Decaëns, T., Palacios‑Vargas, J.G., Castaño‑Meneses, G., Scheffrahn, R.H., Rivera, M., Perez, F., Bobadilla, R., Lopez, Y., Ramirez Silva, J.A., Montejo Cruz, M., Arango Galván, A. & Barrios, H. (2022). Comparison of traditional and DNA metabarcoding samples for monitoring tropical soil arthropods (Formicidae, Collembola and Isoptera). Scientific Reports, 12, 10762. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-14915-2
Donoso, D.A., Basset, Y., Shik, J.Z., Forrister, D.L., Uquillas, A., Salazar Méndez , Y., Arizala, S., Polanco, P., Beckett, S., Dominguez G., D. & Barrios, H. 2022. Male ant reproductive investment in a seasonal wet tropical forest: consequences of future climate change. PLOs One, 17, e0266222.
Lamarre, G.P.A., Pardikes, N.A., Segar, S., Hackforth, C.N., Laguerre, M., Vincent, B., Lopez, Y., Perez, F., Bobadilla, R., Ramírez Silva, J.A., Basset, Y. 2022. More winners than losers over 12 years of monitoring tiger moths (Erebidae: Arctiinae) on Barro Colorado Island, Panama. Biology Letters, 18, 20210519.
2021
Roubik, D.W., Basset, Y., Lopez, Y., Bobadilla, R., Perez, F. & Ramírez Silva, J.A. 2021. Long-term (1979-2019) dynamics of protected orchid bees in Panama. Conservation Science and Practice, 3, e543.
Novotny, V., Miller, S.E., Hrcek, J., Baje, L., Basset, Y., Lewis, O.T., Stewart, A.J.A. & Weiblen, G.D. 2021. Correction. The American Naturalist, 198, 438-439.
Leponce, M., Corbara, B., Delabie, J.H.C, Orivel, J., Aberlenc, H.-P.,Bail, J., Barrios, H., Campos, R.I., Cardoso do Nascimento, I., Compin, A., Didham, R.K., Floren, A., Medianero, E., Ribeiro, S.P., Roisin, Y., Schmidl, J., Tishechkin, A.K., Winchester, N.N., Basset, Y. & Dejean, A. (2021) Spatial and functional structure of an entire ant assemblage in a lowland Panamanian rainforest. Basic and Applied Ecology, 56, 32-44.
Basset, Y., Jorge, L.R., Butterill, P.T., Lamarre, G.P.A., Dahl, C., Ctvrtecka, R., Gripenberg, S., Lewis, O.T., Barrios, H., Brown, J.W., Bunyavejchewin, S., Butcher, B.A., Cognato; A.I., Davies, S.J., Kaman, O., Klimes, P., Knížek, M., Miller, S.E., Morse, G.E., Novotny, V., Pongpattananurak, N., Pramual, P., Quicke, D.L.J., Sakchoowong, W., Umari, R., Vesterinen, E.J., Weiblen, G., Wright, S.J. & Segar, S.T. 2021. Host specificity and interaction networks of insects feeding on seeds and fruits in tropical rainforests. Oikos, 130, 1462-1476.
2020
Basset, Y., Donoso, D.A., Hajibabaei, M., Wright, M.T.G., Perez, K.H.J., Lamarre, G.P.A., De León, L.F., Palacios-Vargas, J.G., Castaño-Meneses, G., Rivera, R., Perez, F., Bobadilla, R., Lopez, Y., Ramirez, J.A. & Barrios, H. 2020. Methodological considerations for monitoring soil/litter arthropods in tropical rainforests using DNA metabarcoding, with a special emphasis on ants, springtails and termites. Metabarcoding and Metagenomics, 4, 151-163.
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Brown, J. W., Gripenberg, S., Basset, Y., Calderón, O., Simon, I., Fernandey, C., Cedeno, M. & Rivera, M. 2020. Host records for Tortricidae (Lepidoptera) reared from seeds and fruits in Panama. Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington, 122, 12-24.
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Basset, Y., Palacios-Vargas, J.G., Donoso, D.A., Castaño-Meneses, G., Decaëns, T., Lamarre, G.P., De León, L.F., Rivera, M., García-Gómez, A., Perez, F., Bobadilla, R., Lopez, Y., Ramirez, J.A., Cruz, M.M., Galván, A.A., Mejía-Recamier, B.E. & Barrios, H. 2020. Enemy-free space and the distribution of ants, springtails and termites in the soil of one tropical rainforest. European Journal of Soil Biology, 99, 103193.
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Didham, R.K., Basset, Y., Collins, M., Leather, S.R.., Littlewood. N.A., Menz, M.H.M., Müller, J., Packer, L., Saunders, M.E., Schönrogge, K., Stewart, A.J.A., Yanoviak, S.P. & Hassall, C. 2020. Interpreting insect declines: seven challenges and a way forward. Insect Conservation and Diversity, 13, 103-114.
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Lamarre, G.P.A., Fayle T.M., Segar, S.T., Laird-Hopkins, B., Nakamura, A., Souto-Vilarós,D., Watanabe, S. & Basset, Y. 2020. Monitoring tropical insects in the 21st century. Advances in Ecological Research, 62, 295-330.
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Harvey, J.A., Heinen , R., Armbrecht , I. Basset, Y., … & de Kroon, H. 2020. International scientists formulate a roadmap for insect conservation and recovery. Nature Ecology and Evolution, 4, 174-176.
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Mottl O., Fibich P., Klimeš P., Volf M., Tropek R., Anderson-Teixeira K., Auga J., Blair T., Butterill P. T., Carscallen G., Gonzalez-Akre E., Goodman A., Kaman O., Lamarre G., Libra M., Losada M.E., Manumbor M., Miller S., Molem K., Nichols G., Plowman N., Redmond C. M., Seifert C. L., Vrána J., Weiblen G., Novotný V. (2020) Spatial covariance of herbivorous and predatory guilds of forest canopy arthropods along a latitudinal gradient. Ecology Letters, 23, 1499–1510.
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Seifert C. L., Lamarre G., Volf M., Ré Jorge L., Miller S., Wagner D.L., Anderson-Teixeira K., Novotný V. (2020) Vertical stratification of a temperate forest caterpillar community in eastern North America. Oecologia 192: 501-514.
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2019
Gripenberg, S., Basset, Y., Lewis, O.T., Terry, J.C.D., Wright, S.J., Simón, I., Fernández, D.C., Cedeño-Sanchez, M., Rivera, M., Barrios, H., Brown, J.W., Calderón, O., Cognato, A.I., Kim, J., Miller, S.E., Morse, G.E., Pinzón-Navarro, S., Quicke, D.L.J., Robbins, R.K., Salminen, J.-P. & Vesterinen, E. 2019. A highly-resolved food web for insect seed predators in a species-rich tropical forest. Ecology Letters, 22, 1638–1649.
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Luk, C.-L., Basset, Y., Kongnoo, P., Hau, B.C.H. & Bonebrake, T.C. 2019. Inter‐annual monitoring improves diversity estimation of tropical butterfly assemblages. Biotropica, 51, 519-528.
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Basset, Y. & Lamarre, G.P.A. 2019. Toward a world that values insects. Science, 364, 1230-1231.
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Solé, R., Gripenberg, S., Lewis, O.T., Markesteijn, L., Barrios, H., Ratz, T. Ctvrtecka, R., Butterill, P.T., Segar, S.T., Metz, M.A., Dahl, C., Rivera, M., Viquez, K., Ferguson, W., Guevara, M. & Basset, Y. 2019. The role of herbivorous insects and pathogens in the regeneration dynamics of Guazuma ulmifolia in Panama. Nature Conservation, 32, 81–101.
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Redmond, C.M., Auga, J., Bradley, G., Segar, S.T., Miller, S.E., Molem, K., Weiblen, G.D., Butterill, P.T., Maiyah, G., Hood, A.S.C., Volf, M., Jorge, L.R., Basset, Y. & Novotný, V. 2019. High specialization and limited structural change in plant-herbivore networks along a successional chronosequence in tropical montane forest. Ecography, 42, 162-172.
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Lopes M.C., Lamarre G., Baraloto C., Fine P., Vincentini A., Baccaro F. (2019) The Amazonas-trap: a new method for sampling plant-inhabiting arthropod communities in tropical forest understory. Entomologia Experimentalis et Applicata 167: 534-543.