Species traits and speciation
A major topic of ongoing interest involves the investigation of factors that promote differences in diversity among clades. In particular, an important problem is the contribution of species-specific traits to disparities among clades in rates of speciation and extinction. By incorporating digestive physiology in a model of speciation rate, I found that in the terrestrial, herbivorous mammals rates of speciation are higher in niche generalists than niche specialists. You can find the paper here.
A major topic of ongoing interest involves the investigation of factors that promote differences in diversity among clades. In particular, an important problem is the contribution of species-specific traits to disparities among clades in rates of speciation and extinction. By incorporating digestive physiology in a model of speciation rate, I found that in the terrestrial, herbivorous mammals rates of speciation are higher in niche generalists than niche specialists. You can find the paper here.
Ecological opportunity and evolutionary diversification
At a lower hierarchical level, what factors generate differences in diversity within clades? Using morphological and phylogenetic data, I found that the availability of new environments promoted the diversification of colobine monkeys in Asia and led to greater diversity in Asia than Africa. You can find the paper here.
At a lower hierarchical level, what factors generate differences in diversity within clades? Using morphological and phylogenetic data, I found that the availability of new environments promoted the diversification of colobine monkeys in Asia and led to greater diversity in Asia than Africa. You can find the paper here.
Anthropogenic disturbance and the genetics of natural populations
I'm also interested in the effects of human activities on the genetics of natural populations. We're working on a RADSeq data set of southwestern Ugandan populations of the black-and-white colobus monkey to disentangle the effects of habitat size and connectivity from habitat quality on genomic diversity.
Genomics of geographic range expansion
How do changes in selective pressures resulting from expansion into range margins affect genomic patterns? One of my current projects focuses on identifying loci under selection in populations of the nine-banded armadillo and assessing associations with environmental variation along a latitudinal gradient. We generated molecular markers using a hybrid capture-RADSeq approach to tackle these questions.
How do changes in selective pressures resulting from expansion into range margins affect genomic patterns? One of my current projects focuses on identifying loci under selection in populations of the nine-banded armadillo and assessing associations with environmental variation along a latitudinal gradient. We generated molecular markers using a hybrid capture-RADSeq approach to tackle these questions.