Congratulations to lab alum Avigayil Lev, who was awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship! Avigayil is working on her PhD in Ecology, Evolutionary Biology and Behavior at the CUNY Graduate Center with Dr. Monica Mowery. She previously completed her senior thesis in the lab and then worked as our research technician for 3 years!  So well deserved!

Our new paper, led by former lab technician Avigayil Lev and co-authored by lab alum Isabella Martinez, has been published today in Biology Letters. We used hemiclonal analysis to measure the fitness consequences of prolonged matings for males during matings with non-virgin/previously mated females. We found that longer matings resulted in higher competitive fertilization success for males with these previously mated females!

We have a new paper out today in Ecology and Evolution! This paper resulted, in part, from research conducted by students in Ali's Fall 2024 Laboratory in Animal Behavior class (BIOL BC2281). This work was led by lab alum Harini Shankar, who was also the undergraduate TA for the course, with all students enrolled in the course contributing as coauthors, and Avigayil Lev (former lab technician) providing additional support.

In this paper, we test whether perceived male-male competition influences male male choice. We find that males show robust preferences for high-quality females regardless of their competitive environment, tying together two interrelated components of sexual selection.

Our new paper is out today in Evolution! This work was led by our lab technician, Avigayil Lev, and co-authored by lab alum (and current biology staff member) Abigail Gutierrez and undergrad Aanya Srinivasan. Although male mate choice is typically thought to evolve because of the direct fitness benefits that males receive from being choosy (in the form of more offspring sired), we show that male mate choice can also confer ​indirect fitness benefits (in the form of more successful daughters) that reinforce these direct benefits. 
Check out Barnard's coverage of this work here.

Our new paper, coauthored by lab alums Grace Freed ('23), Isabella Martinez ('24), Avigayil Lev ('22 and current lab technician), and Ana-Maria Anthony Cuadrado ('20), has been published today in Ecology and Evolution! In this paper, we use hemiclonal analysis to document additive genetic variation in both pre-copulatory and post-copulatory components of male mate choice for large females! This project was a massive undertaking in which we measured male mate choice for over 1300 fruit flies in total! 
Check out Barnard's coverage of this work here.

Our new paper, coauthored by lab technician and Barnard alum Avigayil Lev ('22), has been published in the Journal of Evolutionary Biology! This work, part of a collaboration with Andrew Stewart's lab at Canisius University, uses populations created by Andrew to look at the life history changes associated with >400 generations of artificial selection on body size in Drosophila melanogaster. We found that flies selected for small body size had lower juvenile viability, fecundity, and absolute egg size, but higher relative egg size, than flies selected for large body size. Our findings are consistent with the hypothesis that egg size is a key constraint on body size evolution in this species. Check out Barnard's coverage of this work here. 

Today was Olivia Anastasio's last day as the Pischedda Lab Technician. She is leaving to start a new position as a Laboratory Specialist in the Barnard Biology Department. Olivia will be part of our Introductory Biology team, teaching intro bio labs and discussions. We will miss her in the lab, but the department is lucky to have her!

Taking over as our lab tech will be Pischedda Lab alum Avigayil Lev, who graduated from Barnard in 2022 and completed her Environmental Science senior thesis in the lab. We're thrilled she is able to stay on in the lab! 
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Congrats to Mariel Correa-Maynard, Olivia Eliopoulos, and Avigayil Lev who graduated from Barnard today! Mariel earned a BA in Physiological and Organismal Biology, Olivia earned a BA in Cellular and Molecular Biology, and Avigayil earned a BA in Environmental Science! It was Barnard's first in-person graduation since 2019!