The study of systematics integrates diverse fields of biology including taxonomy, computational biology, genomics, and natural history collections. My research uses these approaches to address fundamental questions about the evolution of tropical plants. In this seminar, I will discuss two major research areas: (1) What processes govern the generation and distribution of tropical biodiversity and (2) are seemingly convergent morphologies produced through similar anatomical and molecular modifications and do they perform similar functions?

Plants are amazing survival artists capable of enduring harsh environments and thriving in newly opened niches. My research seeks to broadly understand how environmental changes and biological interactions re-model the genealogical histories across the plant’s genome, with the aim of identifying key innovations responsible for adaptive changes. At the macroevolutionary scale, I will demonstrate how whole genome duplications buffered plants through a historical global warming, and how ancient gene flows created hyperdiverse clades in the neotropics and Chinese Hengduan Mountains.

How landscape change has shaped patterns of diversity on Earth is a central question in Biology. In Plant Systematics, a great volume of research on this problem has centered on how major geological events shaped the evolution of the Neotropical flora (the world’s richest flora). In this talk, I will show how I rely on natural history observations as a powerful tool for identifying plant groups whose biology make them ideal model systems for approaching long-standing questions from unexplored angles.

Molluscs are familiar invertebrates, from the humble garden slug, to the colorful shells picked up on the beach, to the mercurial shell-less octopus. Being one of the largest, most diverse, and beautiful groups of marine animals, molluscs have been cultivated by humans for centuries for the valuable materials they make (think pearls) and for the nutritious food they provide (menu items such as pulpo, escargot, moules).

Complex biological systems can be described by any one of a number of features, including the tools used to deconstruct interactions between the parcels, actors, and forces that compose these systems. In addition, they are defined by a growing understanding of how context shapes these interactions, and by extension, the behavior of biological systems. In this seminar, I will highlight these aspects of complex biological systems using several different model problems: protein evolution, genomic prediction, and the interaction between pandemics and the criminal legal system.