Our work appears in dozens of scientific papers annually. We also translate our research for the public via popular articles and for students and interns who we teach directly. Our work often changes the way species are described or named, and in many cases has direct influences on conservation. For example, our recently published study of threatened Florida scrub-jay genetics has defined the appropriate population groupings for the conservation of that rapidly declining species. Likewise, our studies of golden-winged warblers in New York and elsewhere have shown how hybridization with the closely related blue-winged warbler is leading to the extirpation of the species throughout much of its current breeding range.
impact statement issue
Much of our work is motivated by the need to apply solid science to conservation issues, which requires, for example: knowing which individuals in a threatened population are breeding and with whom, documenting the extent to which human and natural landscape changes result in barriers to animal movements, documenting biodiversity by defining species and reconstructing their relationships to one another, and testing ideas about how animal behaviors and other traits have changed through time via evolutionary processes.
Understanding the biology of wild animals requires information about their past and present interactions. We use DNA technology to explore the diversity of species of birds and other animals across the landscape and through time.
impact statement response
We have reconstructed the evolutionary histories of thousands of species. Our focus has been primarily on birds, but we have also studied fish, reptiles, insects, and mammals. These studies allow us to place the evolution of traits in context. For example, one of our major findings in the past year was that the variability of the environment, specifically rainfall variation in this case, has driven major changes in the family lives of birds in the starling family: starling species that live in areas of stable rainfall regimes breed in simple pairs, but species that live in areas with highly variable and unpredictable rainfall breed in larger, cooperative groups. This kind of finding is important because it shows how a diversity of family life behaviors can change in response to changing environments.
impact statement summary
We use the tools of molecular biology to document the biodiversity of birds and other animals and to explain their behaviors, ecologies, and evolutionary histories. Our research program integrates studies of evolutionary trees (phylogenetics), speciation, hybridization, animal behavior, ecology, disease ecology, and conservation genetics.
Lovette, Irby Associate Professor and Director of the Fuller Evolutionary Biology Program, and Associate Director for Academic Affairs, Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology
