Research

Ecology and evolutionary biology studies the molecular basis of how organisms adapt to the natural world over evolutionary time, and how the resultant biological diversity in organismal function affects present-day ecological processes. Accordingly, faculty in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology study questions pertinent at a variety of levels of biological organization, from molecular aspects of evolution to organismal physiology and the ecology of terrestrial, freshwater and ocean ecosystems.

Research in the department involves all levels of biological organization, from molecules to genes, to organisms to populations and ecosystems. Research occurs in both the laboratory and field and includes work on a variety of organisms, from phages and bacteria to higher plants and animals. Primary attention is given to evolutionary, ecological, and functional questions rather than to particular habitats or taxa. Faculty and graduate student research are often collaborative and interdisciplinary in approach. Departmental research activities include a variety of topics plant-herbivore, and plant-pollinator interactions, microbial ecology, and coevolution, quantitative genetics, life history evolution, energetics, comparative biomechanics and physiology, behavior, population and reproductive ecology, community ecology and biogeography. These research endeavors provide a balance between empirical and theoretical approaches to evolutionary, organismal, and ecological problems.