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Synopsis

In many animals, including humans, there is mounting evidence that environmental factors that individuals experience during their lives (such as diet and stress) can affect not only their own fitness but also the development and fitness of their offspring (and sometimes even grandoffspring and beyond). Yet, research on such effects (known as maternal and paternal effects) is complicated by genetic variation. In sexually reproducing species, each individual differs genetically from its siblings and its parents, raising the possibility that experimental environments to which parents are exposed affect offspring traits not through direct effects on development but via natural selection on genetic variation. Animals that reproduce clonally—producing offspring that are genetically identical to each other and to their mother—offer valuable opportunities to test for maternal effects without the potentially confounding effects of genetic variation. 

Aims

This project will use the clonally reproducing springtail Folsomia candida to investigate effects of maternal environment on offspring traits.

Benefits to student

You will do cutting-edge research on a high-profile question in evolutionary genetics. Through this project, you will learn how to design and carry out experiments, how to carry out sophisticated statistical analysis, and how to write an influential scientific paper. Honours students in the Bonduriansky lab often publish their work in prestigious journals, such as The American Naturalist, Functional Ecology, Animal Behaviour, and Scientific Reports.

Supervisor: Prof. Russell Bonduriansky