ESF Summer School

Methods of Empirical Speciation Research

August 29th - September 4th, 2010 Eawag, Center for Ecology, Evolution & Biogeochemistry, Kastanienbaum, Switzerland

Goals and objectives of the school:

Speciation research is currently one of the most productive fields of research in evolutionary biology. Its recent great success was often driven by advances in empirical concepts and methodology in population genetics and evolutionary ecology, and the improved integration of these with theory. We are now beginning to see yet another wave of advance, ushered in by the methodological innovations of the genomics era. Studying speciation is a deeply interdisciplinary endeavour that often requires good understanding of very many different concepts and methods in ecology, genetics and evolution. This makes speciation research sometimes more difficult to access for young scientists than more disciplinary research questions in ecology and evolution. The summer school will introduce advanced graduate students to ways successful speciation researchers integrate concepts and methods from various disciplines for testing hypotheses about mechanisms, modes and drivers of speciation.

The summer school combines modular lecture series by five leading scientists in the field, Roger Butlin, Scott Hodges, Katie Peichel, Peter Saetre and Sander van Doorn, with individual lectures, workshops and field excursions to speciation research sites in the Alps taught by Elena Conti, Martine Maan, Walter Salzburger, Arjun Sivasundar, Piet Spaak, Alex Widmer and Ole Seehausen. We will cover topics such as the major mechanisms of speciation, interactions between natural and sexual selection, adaptive radiation, hybrid zones and hybrid speciation, Fst outlier analysis, speciation genes and speciation traits, studying mate choice, inferring causality in speciation research. The course emphasizes the integration of empirical speciation research with latest developments in speciation theory.

The target audience is PhD students and exceptionally well qualified MSc students with background in evolutionary biology, population genetics or ecology.

Participants:

We will accept a maximum of 25 PhD students and exceptionally well qualified MSc students

Location:

The Summer School will be held at the Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Biogeochemistry (CEEB) of Eawag in Kastanienbaum, Switzerland. Eawag is a Swiss Federal Research Institute in the ETH domain, and its Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Biogeochemistry is situated at the shores of Lake Lucerne. The centre has several seminar rooms, various state of the art laboratories, on-site housing for students and scientists, and is located near excellent field sites for a wide range of speciation studies.

Funding:

ESF Networking Program Frontiers in Speciation Research FROSpects