Biology faculty member co-authors research presentation at national conference

Assistant Professor of Biology Jen Hamel co-authored a research presentation on mating behavior and hybridization.

An oral presentation at the Society of Integrative and Comparative Biology Conference (SICB) in Tampa, Florida, was titled, “A Tangled Web: Why do Some Individuals Mate with the Wrong Species?” and was presented by Ginny Greenway, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Florida. Co-authors included Hamel and Christine Miller, an associate professor at the University of Florida.

The conference presentation summarized findings from an experiment in which the mating behavior of individually marked insects of two species was monitored in large arenas. Individuals of the two focal species have been observed mating together in the field in North Florida, and one of the two species is not native to this region. The researchers used hourly panoramic photographs taken by robotically mounted and programmed digital cameras to quantify mating interactions of individuals in the arenas, and social network analysis to infer possible drivers of hybridization. Findings suggest that relatively high levels of hybridization may occur when individuals have limited choices of mates combined with low reproductive penalties for hybridizing.

The Society of Integrative and Comparative Biology Conference is a national conference attended by researchers in organismal biology.