ResearchI work across a broad range of topics in evolutionary ecology.
From 2017 - 2020 I was an ARC DECRA fellow in the School of Biological Sciences at Monash University. I worked with Matt Hall's group using Daphnia to ask questions about the evolution of sexual reproduction. Before that I was a postdoc in Hanna Kokko's group at the Institute of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich (meet other Kokkonuts here). We were part of the Finnish Centre of Excellence in Biological Interactions. And I did all my fieldwork at the Tvärminne Zoological Station in Finland. From 2012-2014 I was a postdoc in Göran Arnqvist's lab at the Evolutionary Biology Centre, Uppsala University, Sweden. I completed my PhD in January 2012 at the Australian National University's Research School of Biology, supervised by Pat Backwell and Michael Jennions. Find me on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/isobel-booksmythe For my complete (and relatively up-to-date) academic CV click here. Here is a list of my publications; citation info via Google Scholar is here. You can read about some of my research interests below. Fighting, territoriality, and cooperation - fiddler crabs!Photo: Tanya Detto
I had a lot of fun during my PhD under the supervision of the amazing Pat Backwell and Michael Jennions. I studied many and varied aspects of the behaviour of fiddler crabs - the most charismatic crustaceans you will ever encounter and an awesome study system into the bargain.
See my publications to find out about 'dear enemy' relationships between neighbours, cooperative defense of territories, mate choice in males and females, and more. Here is a poster about cooperative territory defence in crabs.
|
News archive02.04.19 Toby Hector and I have written a Digest article for Evolution about this cool new meta-analysis that finds there is less evidence for the virulence-transmission trade-off than you might have thought...
27.08.18 I wrote a review with a great group of collaborators for the Phil Trans theme issue 'Linking local adaptation with the evolution of sex differences,' edited by Tim Connallon, Flo Débarre and Xiang-Yi Li. Find out what reciprocal transplant experiments can reveal about sex-specific adaptation, and then check out the rest of the really interesting issue! 16.06.18 Nina, Hanna and I explore the theory behind sex allocation in facultative sexuals in a paper online at The American Naturalist today. 02.03.18 Big news from Zürich where Kokkonut Nina Gerber has successfully defended her PhD, and earned a celebratory hat in departmental tradition. In this case the hat itself is far from traditional! Congratulations Dr. Gerber! 26.02.18 ... And the second Daphnia field study is now out in Ecology Letters! This one looks at offspring sex allocation - when to make males in a facultative sexual system. 17.01.18 Very happy to finally have our first Daphnia field study published today! Nina Gerber led this intensive field investigation of how the costs of sex affect its timing. 18.09.17 Back in Australia, and excited to start my DECRA at Monash University! 22.05.17 Had a great visit to the BES at Stirling University to give a seminar on the timing of sex in Daphnia. Thanks Luc Bussiere for inviting me, and letting me catch my first dance flies! 07.03.17 Stuart Auld from Stirling University in the UK was my guest and the invited speaker in the departmental seminar series this week. Stu is doing some cool stuff on epidemic dynamics in Daphnia and gave a great talk about his work - and check out his intriguing paper on infection and sex... 23.11.16 More mosquitofish: Séverine Buechel, Alex Kotrschal and Niclas Kolm at Stockholm University measured the brains of fish from our gonopodium selection lines looking for signs of a cognitive arms race against harassment. The paper is out today in Proceedings B. 27.10.16 It was great to visit the University of Jyväskylä and talk about Daphnia sex ratios - thanks to Bibiana Rojas for hosting me! 08.10.16 Anna Harts, Michael Jennions and I did a meta-analysis on mate guarding, paternity, and male phenotype in birds - now accepted in Evolution! 04.09.16 No songs or dances about this one, but it is so cool it stands alone anyway! The brilliant Karoline Fritzsche leads a new paper with Göran Arnqvist and me in Current Biology: Sex ratio bias leads to the evolution of sex role reversal in honey locust beetles. 01.09.16 Some clever people have made a song about our mosquitofish study, and it's been stuck in my head for days! Much catchier than reading the paper: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JSd4kcPdD0 31.07.16 Another field season at Tvärminne is over. This year with a major side project: dancing Nina's PhD! Learn about the Daphnia life cycle and what happens when biologists are isolated for ~2 months: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LR5m29wmqc 18.05.16 The mosquitofish genitalia paper is now online: Fitness consequences of artificial selection on relative male genital size. Check it out! 12.04.16 Exciting news - paper with Megan Head, Scott Keogh, and Michael Jennions has been accepted by Nature Communications! Keep an eye out for it if you've always wondered whether mosquitofish genitalia are evolvable... 28.08.15 Paper accepted! It was an epic journey but Brian Mautz, Jac Davis, Michael Jennions, the tireless Shinichi Nakagawa and I have an upcoming meta-analysis in Biological Reviews on whether females adjust the offspring sex ratio in response to their mate's attractiveness. 15.08.15 The ESEB meeting in Lausanne was excellent. You can see the fantastic plenary lectures here. 01.08.15 First Daphnia field season completed! We had lots of fun at the Tvärminne Zoological Station - read the blog for some impressions of the field work (and Finnish summer). Now to see what the data say! 01.12.14 Now posting (still irregularly) from Zurich... 12.11.14 First beetle paper accepted! Booksmythe, Fritzsche & Arnqvist, "Sperm competition generates evolution of increased paternal investment in a sex role-reversed seed beetle", Journal of Evolutionary Biology. 17.10.14 Somehow I'm on another modelling paper - thanks to the braininess of Hanna Kokko and Michael Jennions! Just accepted to the Journal of Evolutionary Biology. 04.10.13 Thanks again to the Stiftelsen för Zoologisk Forskning, I will be attending ISBE 2014 next August in New York... 10.09.13 Just back from the outstanding Ento 13 conference at the University of St. Andrews. My first entomological meeting - the bar has been set high! 25.08.13 Had a great time at ESEB 2013 - and my poster won second prize! Thanks ESEB! 09.08.13 Karoline Fritzsche and I discuss the measurement of sexual selection in both sexes as part of a special column in Current Zoology: "New horizons in sexual selection research". 14.12.12 Catherine Hayes' paper, "Does male reproductive effort increase with age? Courtship in fiddler crabs" accepted to Biology Letters. 06.11.12 Paper on male mate choice and competitor size accepted to Animal Behaviour! 19.10.12 Lisa Schwanz, Hanna Kokko and I have had a paper accepted to Evolution: "The complex interplay of sex allocation and sexual selection". While you're waiting for it, check out the paper that inspired us by Tim Fawcett and colleagues. 09.10.12 Thanks to the Stiftelsen för Zoologisk Forskning (Foundation for Zoological Research) at the EBC, who will provide funding for me to attend ESEB 2013 in Lisbon! 27.09.12 Website... |