Brian Langerhans Research Group

The lab compares multiple populations and species across different environments to investigate the forces that generate biological diversity. Researchers combine those comparisons with experiments examining relationships between observable traits, organismal performance and evolutionary fitness. Much of the work studies how predators and other selective pressures shape diversification in small livebearing fishes of the genus Gambusia. The research spans ecological speciation, human-induced evolution, locomotion and predation, connecting environmental differences with changes in organisms and populations.