Recent Courses

EE BIOL 100 – Introduction to Ecology and Behavior
EE BIOL 100L – Introduction to Ecology and Behavior Lab
EE BIOL 132 – Field Behavioral Ecology (a Field Biology Quarter course)
EE BIOL 99, 199, 198 – Undergraduate Research
EE BIOL 297 – Graduate Seminar (variable topics)

Research Areas

Behavior, Conservation Biology, Ecology, Evolutionary Biology, Theory

Research Interests

I have many research interests and this is reflected by the diverse projects in my lab. Our focus is at the level of phenotypes, but we make good use of molecular tools too. We tend to study animals that can be easily observed and manipulated in the field, but no taxa, habitats, or regions are considered out of bounds.
Few would deny that the behavior of animals is an integral part of their ecology and evolution, but biologists often make unwarranted assumptions about behavior. Taking behavior into account can completely change the expected dynamics of a system.
Aggression between species is very common and often just as intense as aggression within species. Evolutionary responses to interspecific aggression must therefore be a major determinant of how species diversify. Yet aggression is understudied compared to other types of interactions, such as predation, hybridization, and exploitative competition. We are helping to fill this void with theoretical and empirical research.

Selected Publications

https://sites.lifesci.ucla.edu/eeb-gretherlab/publications/