Research in our lab is rooted in understanding the origins and maintenance of diversity. We are particularly interested in speciation, the process by which new species arise. Despite decades of research, we still lack a complete mechanistic understanding of speciation. That is, what traits permit the emergence of new species? and how are these traits encoded at the molecular level? These gaps in our knowledge are especially true when more complex traits like behavior are involved. We are using hybrid zones and emerging tools from fields as disparate as movement ecology, biomechanics, genomics, bioinformatics, and neurobiology to fill these gaps. Much of our work focuses on seasonal migration, arguably one of the most widespread and amazing behaviors exhibited by animals today. Many of the species we study are affected by climate change. Accordingly, our work also expands into conservation biology, developing data-driven management plans for these species. Much of our work focuses on single systems but wherever possible we expand out into larger comparative work using data from museum specimens and sequence archives.

Research Keywords: Speciation, Hybridization, Behavior, Genomics, Transcriptomics, Epigenomics, Neurobiology