Julia Saltz
Indiana University, IN·Ecology & Evolution
Why do some populations carry the genetic variation needed to adapt to a changing environment while others do not? A key ingredient is genotype-by-environment interaction (GxE): individuals with different genes respond differently to the same surroundings.
- Fields
Ecology & Evolution
Genetics
Mathematics & Statistics
- Topics
genotype-by-environment interaction
GxE
phenotypic plasticity
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jul 2027
What they work on
- Test how fruit flies' preference for a particular environment relates to their experience in that environment, and how both shape individual patterns of plasticity and fitness.
- Identify gene expression networks that produce individual variation in behavior and that functionally link environment choice to plasticity in fruit flies.
- Build population-genetic models of how variation in environmental exposure shapes genetic variation in responses to environments and controls the expression and evolution of GxE.
- Combine fly experiments with theory to predict GxE within and among generations, producing a framework other researchers can apply to any organism.
More about the research
This collaborative project focuses on how an individual's choice of environment, such as where to live, relates to the developmental processes that environment then shapes, including later behavior and survival. It also asks how these links differ among individuals. Rather than starting from population-level patterns, the team starts with developmental differences between individuals and works upward.
Why it matters
This is basic research on how evolution works in variable environments. Bottom-up predictions about GxE are currently lacking. New mathematical tools could eventually help biologists predict which populations are vulnerable to environmental change. The summer program gives high school teachers hands-on research experience and helps them build classroom lessons in genetics and mathematical theory.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Kimberly Hughes
Florida State University, FL·Ecology & Evolution
Test how a fruit fly's preference for an environment and its experience in it combine to produce patterns of plasticity and fitness, and which individuals become plastic.
Kerry Geiler-Samerotte
Arizona State University Campus Immersion, AZ·Ecology & Evolution·Early-career
Evolve thousands of DNA-barcoded yeast lineages across subtly different temperatures to measure how the genetic basis of adaptation and the distribution of fitness effects (DFE) shift along the gradient.
Patricia Wittkopp
University of Michigan, MI·Genetics
Identify the genes and specific DNA changes behind trait differences within and between fruit fly (Drosophila) species, and determine how they alter molecular, cellular and developmental processes.
The school
Indiana University: 21 labs on PI Pages, $897M a year on research, 438 research doctorates a year.
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