In: Molecular Ecology, 2011, vol. 20, no. 9, p. 1795-1798
Unravelling the mechanisms underlying variation in life history traits is of fundamental importance for our understanding of adaptation by natural selection. While progress has been made in mapping fitness-related phenotypes to genotypes, mainly in a handful of model organisms, functional genomic studies of life history adaptations are still in their infancy. In particular, despite a few...
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In: Evolution, 2014, vol. 68, no. 5, p. 1385–1398
Understanding how natural environments shape phenotypic variation is a major aim in evolutionary biology. Here, we have examined clinal, likely genetically based variation in morphology among 19 populations of the fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) from Africa and Europe, spanning a range from sea level to 3000 m altitude and including locations approximating the southern and northern range...
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In: Evolution, 2013, vol. 67, no. 12, p. 3573–3587
The major goal of evolutionary thermal biology is to understand how variation in temperature shapes phenotypic evolution. Comparing thermal reaction norms among populations from different thermal environments allows us to gain insights into the evolutionary mechanisms underlying thermal adaptation. Here, we have examined thermal adaptation in six wild populations of the fruit fly (Drosophila...
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In: Experimental Gerontology, 2011, vol. 46, no. 2, p. 141–147
In the last two decades it has become clear that hormones and gene mutations in endocrine signaling pathways can exert major effects on lifespan and related life history traits in worms, flies, mice, and other organisms. While most of this research has focused on insulin/insulin-like growth factor-1 signaling, a peptide hormone pathway, recent work has shown that also lipophilic hormones play...
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In: Evolution Letters, 2018, vol. 2, no. 6, p. 567–579
Much has been learned about the genetics of aging from studies in model organisms, but still little is known about naturally occurring alleles that contribute to variation in longevity. For example, analysis of mutants and transgenes has identified insulin signaling as a major regulator of longevity, yet whether standing variation in this pathway underlies microevolutionary changes in...
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