My research emphasizes understanding the processes that generate and impact biological diversity, with a focus on adaptive evolution across different levels of biological organization. I generally study organismal adaptation to novel environments because the signature of rapid evolution in response to new selection regimes is inscribed clearly at multiple levels. I use these signatures of change at varied levels of organization (from genes to phenotypes to behaviors to community assemblages) to ask mechanistic questions about the process of diversification. By integrating genomic-scale experiments and field-based studies, I like to make use of technological advances while remaining grounded in natural history. Currently my work addresses mechanistic questions about speciation and extinction in reptile and amphibian assemblages in two distinct environments in the western US:

Ecological divergence in lizards: Several lizard species exhibit dramatic color variation associated with the geologically recent substrates of White Sands National Monument and the Carrizozo Lava Flow. In this system I use comparisons among multiple species and multiple environments to understand the ways in which organismal response to divergent selection is predictable at the genetic and phenotypic levels. Read more...

Disease processes in frogs: Amphibians around the world have been experiencing massive population declines due to infection with a virulent chytrid fungus. In this system I leverage whole genome sequencing efforts for the model frog species, Xenopus tropicalis and the chytrid Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis to study the genomics of infection in both host and pathogen and to investigate the impact of chytrid on wild populations of non-model frogs impacted by the disease. Read more...

News

I will be starting a new lab at the University of Idaho during the summer of 2008. If you are interested in joining the lab, please see the Contact page.