University of South Florida | United States
Stephanie M. Coronado is a postdoctoral fellow in the Geography and Environmental Science Program at the University of South Florida, where she began her appointment. She earned her PhD in Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Biology from the University of Nevada, Reno holds a Bachelor of Science in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from the University of California, Santa Cruz (2013). Her research centers on ant–plant mutualisms, canopy ecology, tropical agroforestry and herbivore-community assembly — for example exploring how keystone ant species shape arboreal ant diversity and how plant–ant mutualists influence caterpillar communities. She has published peer-reviewed articles in journals such as Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution and Biotropica, and has additional manuscripts in preparation for submission to high-impact journals. Her research contributions include investigations of species-pool effects, ontogeny of mutualistic ant-plants, and agroecological biodiversity patterns. Recognized for her work with awards such as the Outstanding Graduate Student Assistant Award (University of Nevada, Reno, 2024) and the Diana Hadley-Lynch Scholarship (2023-24), she also contributes as a peer-reviewer for multiple ecology and entomology journals. In her ongoing career she aims to deepen our mechanistic understanding of how biotic interactions drive diversity patterns under global change.
Featured Publications
Coronado, S. M., López-Muñoz, R., Morris, J. R., & Jiménez-Soto, E. (2025). A keystone ant species drives patterns of arboreal ant diversity in the canopy of a tropical coffee agroforest. Myrmecological News.
Coronado, S. M., Vincent, A. G., Pozos, F. H., Espinoza Siezar, L. A., & Pringle, E. G. (2025). Challenges in the early ontogeny of a mutualistic plant: Resource availability and plant defense in juvenile Cecropia ant-plants. Biotropica.
Villamarín-Cortez, S., Hankin, L., Coronado, S. M., Macdonald, J., & Noriega, J. A. (2022). Diversity and distribution patterns of Ecuador’s dung beetles (Coleoptera: Scarabaeinae). Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution.