About Me
I recently finished my PhD project in Ole Seehausen's research group at Eawag Kastanienbaum and at the University of Bern, Switzerland and stay on for a short postdoc until the end of the year. After that I will move for an SNF mobility postdoc in Boston. My research interests broadly concern the evolutionary processes and mechanisms that are involved in generating and maintaining biological diversity. I am particularly interested in the role of behaviour in these processes, and in the genetic makeup of traits underlying the evolution of reproductive isolation.
PhD Project
In the Lake Victoria haplochromine cichlid adaptive radiation, hundreds of species have evolved within the Lake in only ~15k years. Many species of haplochromine cichlids co-exist at any one location in the lake, making it an ideal system to study factors that contribute(d) to the evolution and/or maintenance of reproductive isolation between these species, and ultimately to speciation.
In my PhD project, I was using the Lake Victoria haplomchromine cichlid system to investigate the genetic architecture of key traits in speciation. One main focus of my study was on genetically mapping traits that are important for pre-zygotic isolation in many of these species, such as female mate preference and male nuptial colour. Another focus was on mapping traits that distinguish different trophic specialists. Lastly, I aimed to asses the role of post-zygotic intrinsic incompatibilities in this system.
