Ecology and evolution of complex physiological systems in birds - an organismal perspective

My main research interest is to understand the ways in which animals have evolutionarily adapted their physiological setup to the environment in which they live. I focus on tropical birds as model systems and am especially interested in finding out how the physiological system of tropical birds is organized to function optimally at low latitudes. I compare physiological patterns found in tropical birds to temperate zone species to study the evolution of complex physiolocal systems. My research integrates physiology, ecology and evolution and is aimed at a functional understanding of short- and long-term animal-environment interactions.

In my lab, we conduct field work in Panama, the Galapagos, and the US to learn about patterns in nature. We combine these data with laboratory experiments to unravel the underlying physiological mechanisms. We observe the birds' behavior, use field endocrinological techniques to analyze physiological processes such as hormonal responses to environmental changes, and conduct experiments in the field or under controlled conditions in the lab to investigate causal relationships between physiology and behavior.

We are currently studying the following main questions: