David Lowry

I am graduate student in John Willis' lab studying the connection between adaptation and speciation in the yellow monkeyflower (Mimulus guttatus). The focus of my research is to understand the ecological and genetic mechanisms that contribute to reproductive isolation between coast and inland populations of Mimulus as well as reproductive isolation among populations living on and off copper mines. I am utilizing a variety of techniques including various population genetic analyses, reciprocal transplant experiments, and Quantitative Trait Loci (QTL) analysis for studies of reproductive isolation. Thus far, I have found that coast and inland populations of M. guttatus in California and Oregon compose two distinct morphologically and genetically structured ecogeographic races. Further, adaptations to seasonal drought and ocean salt spray contribute greatly to reproductive isolation between coast and inland populations. I am in the process of determining the genetic mechanisms that underlie these adaptations through QTL analysis and fine-mapping of large-effect QTLs. I am pursuing an integration of QTL analysis with candidate genes and Mimulus genomic sequence data to try to clone genes involved in adaptation and reproductive isolation. I am also developing near-isogenic lines of large-effect QTLs using marker assisted selection to test whether these particular loci are actually adaptive under field conditions.

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