Joe Travis
Robert O. Lawton Distingushed Professor of Biology
Florida State University, Tallahassee
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I fell in love with ecology and evolutionary biology as an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania, where I met David. He was a first-year graduate student and I was a senior undergraduate and we bonded while taking the inaugural offering of a field biology class taught by three redoubtable Penn faculty members. We have been close friends ever since.
While David built his research program initially on guppies, I built mine, under the tutelage of the great Henry Wilbur, on the effects of population density and predation on tadpoles in temporary ponds. I continued this work when I began faculty life at Florida State University. Within two years at FSU, I discovered poeciliid fishes, specifically, the sailfin molly, Poecilia latipinna, the least killifish, Heterandria formosa, and the eastern mosquitofish, Gambusia holbrooki. I gradually steered my research program to the population ecology, population genetics, and evolutionary biology of these three species. Of course, David was a great help as I cultivated my intuition and expertise with a set of new empirical study systems. Along the way I also worked with Bob Ricklefs on ecomorphology of bird communities and worked with several students on the reproductive ecology of a perennial lily, Zigadenus muscatoxicus (which was Amianthium muscatoxicum then).
David and I worked together off and on for many years, from writing a comment in 1984 on a paper about the cost of reproduction to producing several book chapters discussing adaptation and how it can be best studied in real time. About twelve years ago, David proposed that I join him in developing the FIBR project. The rest is history, as the saying goes, and we have had the good fortune to work with a large number of extremely talented scientists of all orientations and backgrounds. The success of this project is a tribute to what a lot of talented people can do when they work together well.
Of course, I’ve kept up my work in north Florida. At present, I collaborate with my FSU colleagues Kim Hughes, Leithen M’Gonigle, and graduate student Liz Lange on investigating the maintenance of genetic variation in molly populations and the role of social interactions in protecting a striking male polymorphism. Kim and I also collaborate with postdoctoral scholar Zach Culumber and graduate student Eve Culbreth on the role of indirect genetic effects in mosquitofish populations. And with Erica Crespi from Washington State University I study the ways in which the molecular stress axis of least killifish respond to long-term stressors and novel stressors.
In general I am interested in how populations adapt to local circumstances and how variation among individuals translates into the birth and death rates that drive numerical dynamics. Guppies, mollies, mosquitofish, and least killifish offer different perspectives on these issues and, for me, being engaged in all of these projects ensures that I keep learning new ideas from very smart students and collaborators and, I hope, do not harden my opinions about how nature works.
Robert O. Lawton Distingushed Professor of Biology
Florida State University, Tallahassee
Website
I fell in love with ecology and evolutionary biology as an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania, where I met David. He was a first-year graduate student and I was a senior undergraduate and we bonded while taking the inaugural offering of a field biology class taught by three redoubtable Penn faculty members. We have been close friends ever since.
While David built his research program initially on guppies, I built mine, under the tutelage of the great Henry Wilbur, on the effects of population density and predation on tadpoles in temporary ponds. I continued this work when I began faculty life at Florida State University. Within two years at FSU, I discovered poeciliid fishes, specifically, the sailfin molly, Poecilia latipinna, the least killifish, Heterandria formosa, and the eastern mosquitofish, Gambusia holbrooki. I gradually steered my research program to the population ecology, population genetics, and evolutionary biology of these three species. Of course, David was a great help as I cultivated my intuition and expertise with a set of new empirical study systems. Along the way I also worked with Bob Ricklefs on ecomorphology of bird communities and worked with several students on the reproductive ecology of a perennial lily, Zigadenus muscatoxicus (which was Amianthium muscatoxicum then).
David and I worked together off and on for many years, from writing a comment in 1984 on a paper about the cost of reproduction to producing several book chapters discussing adaptation and how it can be best studied in real time. About twelve years ago, David proposed that I join him in developing the FIBR project. The rest is history, as the saying goes, and we have had the good fortune to work with a large number of extremely talented scientists of all orientations and backgrounds. The success of this project is a tribute to what a lot of talented people can do when they work together well.
Of course, I’ve kept up my work in north Florida. At present, I collaborate with my FSU colleagues Kim Hughes, Leithen M’Gonigle, and graduate student Liz Lange on investigating the maintenance of genetic variation in molly populations and the role of social interactions in protecting a striking male polymorphism. Kim and I also collaborate with postdoctoral scholar Zach Culumber and graduate student Eve Culbreth on the role of indirect genetic effects in mosquitofish populations. And with Erica Crespi from Washington State University I study the ways in which the molecular stress axis of least killifish respond to long-term stressors and novel stressors.
In general I am interested in how populations adapt to local circumstances and how variation among individuals translates into the birth and death rates that drive numerical dynamics. Guppies, mollies, mosquitofish, and least killifish offer different perspectives on these issues and, for me, being engaged in all of these projects ensures that I keep learning new ideas from very smart students and collaborators and, I hope, do not harden my opinions about how nature works.
