POSTDOC
Princeton University
Postdoctoral Teaching Fellows Program

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Dr. Melissa Hughes,
the Eva Gossman Fellow in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, received her BA in Biology from Bucknell University in 1988, and her PhD in Zoology from Duke University in 1994. She then spent two additional years at Duke, during which time she shifted her research focus from marine biology to the study of bird song, and taught two semesters of introductory biology. From 1996-7, she was an Alexander von Humboldt post-doctoral fellow at the Free University of Berlin. In the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Melissa has collaborated with another post-doc, Mace Hack, in the development of a new course: Animal Communication, which they have taught twice. This course attempts to synthesize material from ecology, evolution, physiology, physics and economics, and has involved a combination of traditional lecture formats with discussions, debates (based on conflicts over issues from the current literature), hands-on demonstrations and activities, and writing assignments with peer review. Melissa studies how song in song birds functions in territorial defense and mate attraction, especially in song and swamp sparrows. This research includes field observations and experiments, digital analysis of song, and molecular analysis. This year, Dr. Hughes expanded her study site in the field, almost doubling the number of territories she is studying. She is continuing to study the reasons for the variety in the sparrows' songs, as well as the process by which they acquire such a vast repertoire. The first results of this study will be presented at an international meeting in August 2000.