Current lab members 

Robert Cox - PI

Bob is an evolutionary ecologist whose interests span from comparative endocrinology and physiology to behavioral ecology and evolutionary genetics. His current projects are focused on integrating quantitative genetics, endocrinology, and genomics to study intralocus sexual conflict and life-history tradeoffs.

email Bob           Bob also likes to draw pictures of birds and brew beer
Rachana Bhave - graduate student

Rachana joined our lab in 2016 and is currently testing for differences in morphology and fitness between "male-like" (chevron) and "female-like" (bar, diamond, diamond-bar) dorsal pattern morphs in female brown anoles while also beginning her own project partitioning variance in fitness due to pre- and post-copulatory episodes of sexual selection in anoles. Her MS work explored personality along the shyness-boldness axis in agamid lizards.

email Rachana  ​
Aaron Reedy - grad student and NSF Broadening Participation postdoc 

Aaron recently finished his PhD dissertation on sex differences in behavior, life history, parasitism, and natural selection. Aaron is now an NSF Broadening Participation postdoc working with Tonia Schwartz at Auburn University, but he continues to develop his DataClassroom project at UVA and collaborate with us on field research in Florida. Before graduate school, Aaron taught biology at Kelly High School in Chicago, where he pioneered the model of teacher-scientist collaboration and authentic classroom science that is the centerpiece of our Evolution Education program.

email Aaron         Check out Aaron's website
Heidi Seears - NSF postdoc

Heidi is an ecological and evolutionary geneticist who uses genomic and bioinformatic techniques to study speciation, biogeography, and sexual selection. Her current projects with our group are developing and implementing high-throughput genotyping panels of SNP loci to conduct population-wide parentage analyses, quantify sexual selection, and explore the population-genetic and genomic signatures of intralocus sexual conflict in wild anole populations.

email Heidi ​
Tyler Wittman - graduate student

Tyler joined our lab in 2016 and is currently leading a project exploring the effects of testosterone on between-sex genetic correlations while also beginning his own PhD project exploring the fitness consequences of parasitism in wild anole populations. His MS research focused on mate choice and pheromone marking in parasitoid wasps.

email Tyler
Former lab members ​
Albert Chung - undergraduate and lab manager (2012-16)

As an undergraduate, Albert studied metabolic rate in anoles and also contributed to a paper on parasites as a cost of reproduction. After graduating, Albert continued to work with our group on field trips to Florida and as our animal facilty manager. He is currently a graduate student with Christian Cox at Georgia Southern University, where he is again collaborating with us to measure age- and tissue-specificity of sex-biased gene expression in brown anoles for his MS thesis. 
Robin Costello - research rotation (2014-15)

Robin developed our technique for quantifying dewlap coloration using reflectance spectroscopy, and her rotation project using this method led to our paper on the quantitative genetics of sex differences in dewlap color. She is now studying social networks in forked fungus beetles with Butch Brodie.
Christian "Free Meat" Cox - postdoc (2012-15)

Christian took the lead on a variety of projects during his postdoc in our lab, including studies of sex and species differences in growth-regulatory gene expression, the effects of testosterone on female anoles, and the evolutionary physiology of metabolic rate and evaporative water loss in reptiles. Christian is now an Assistant Professor of Biology at Georgia Southern University. He's also an avid homebrewer, and we miss his particularly excellent Funky Dark Saison (mmmm, Brettanomyces).

Check out the other Cox lab at Georgia Southern!
John David Curlis - undergraduate (2012-15)

John David led a project on sex and population differences in metabolic rate of anoles and also contributed to our recent study on quantitative genetics of thermal physiology. He recently completed his MS with Christian Cox at Georgia Southern, where he studied population genetics of color polymorphism in ground snakes. After lots of birding, herping, and research in Panama, Costa Rica, and Honduras, John David is on his way to the University of Michigan to begin his doctoral research in 2018. 

Check John David's awesome nature photography
Hannah Donald-Cannon (2013-14)

Hannah ran our Anolis breeding colony for several years and collaborated on our studies of the developmental breakdown of between-sex genetic correlations. She's now a research technician in Vince Formica's lab at Swarthmore College, where she is studying social selection in forked fungus beetles.
Cara Giordano - undergraduate (2015-18)

Cara recently completed her Distinguished Majors Project exploring the dewlap as a signal of good genes and male quality. It turns out that the dewlap most reliably signals the age of a male, becoming incresingly yellow over time. Her presentation won first place at the annual Katz Research Symposium. Cara is also the only undergraduate to achieve "Professional" status when it comes to catching hatchling anoles.
Amanda Hanninen - graduate student (MA in 15)

Amanda studied the interactions between brown anoles and a sexually transmitted nematode worm, Cyrtosomum penneri. She also streamlined the hormone assays for our studies of the effects of testosterone on female anoles.
Ariel Kahrl - graduate student (PhD in 2017)

Ariel's dissertation took the lab in an entirely new direction by focusing on the evolution of sperm morphology in anoles and other lizards. She published a variety of papers on topics such as the condition-dependence of sperm morpholoy, the coevolution of testis size and sexual size dimorphism, differences in sperm morphology between native and introduced anoles, and even the evolution of the Anolis ​gut microbiome. Ariel is now a postdoc with John Fitzpatrick at Stockholm University.

Check out Ariel's website
Matthew Kustra - undergraduate (2016-18)

Matt recently completed his Distinguished Majors Project showing that sperm count and sperm morphology change with fine-scale variation in population density across our island population of anoles. In fall 2018, he will head to UC Santa Cruz to begin graduate school with an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship that he recently won.
Liza Mitchem - research rotation (2017-18)

Liza conducted a rotation project quantifying effects of testosterone on aggression and signaling behavior in juvenile male and female anoles. She's now studying aggression and social networks in forked fungus beetles with Butch Brodie.

email Lisa
Jennifer Price - postdoc and lab manager (2012-2013)

Jennifer ran our Anolis breeding colony for several years and generated the initial data for our common-garden comparisons of sexual dimorphism between populations of brown anoles from Eleuthera and Great Exuma. She also worked with Josh Nash on a project showing that incubated anole eggs hatch in response to photoperiodic cues.
Nicky Rose - lab manager (2015-16)

Nicky ran our Anolis colony and generated the F2 generation for our ongoing breeding study. She now works for the UVA Office of Animal Welfare. Nicky also makes exceptional cakes and cupcakes at her bakery, Kraken Cakes!

Order cakes, cupcakes, and desserts from Kraken Cakes