Dissertation Research: Unraveling the genetic basis for complex life-history traits in natural populations of garter snakes

个体如何应对环境压力(温度变化、毒素、疾病、社会互动)会影响个体的行为、繁殖能力和寿命。因此，重要的是要了解个体的基因构成如何决定其对压力的反应；以及种群如何随着环境条件的变化而进化。该项目使用天然蛇种群来解决这些问题，天然蛇种群由生活缓慢(繁殖率低，寿命延长)或快速生活(繁殖率高，寿命缩短)的个体组成，这些个体以不同的方式对环境压力做出反应，但基因构成仅略有不同。对这些种群的应激实验被用来表征它们在应激反应中的生理差异。然后，新的DNA测序技术被用来识别允许它们以不同方式对压力做出反应的潜在基因。一旦这些基因被识别出来，我们将进一步探索它们在不同环境条件下生活的不同种群中发生了怎样的变化。这项研究将帮助我们了解哪些基因对自然种群的应激反应是重要的，以及它们如何随着不同的环境压力条件而进化。这里研究的许多基因都与新陈代谢、糖尿病和衰老有关。由于动物有许多相同的基因，只是略有不同，所以用繁殖、寿命和压力反应自然不同的蛇种群进行实验，可以帮助我们了解许多动物物种中导致这些特征的基因，包括牲畜和人类。

How an individual responds to environmental stress (temperature changes, toxins, disease, social interactions) affects how that individual acts, its ability to reproduce, and its lifespan. Therefore, it is important to understand how the genetic make-up of an individual determines how it responds to stress; and how populations evolve in response to their environmental conditions. This project addresses these questions using natural snake populations that consist of either slow-living (low reproduction, extended lifespan) or fast-living (high reproduction, shortened lifespan) individuals who respond to environmental stresses in different ways, but only slightly differ in genetic make-up. Stress experiments on these populations are used to characterize their physiological differences in stress response. New DNA sequencing technologies are then used to identify the underlying genes that allow them to respond to stress in different ways. Once these genes have been identified, they are explored further to understand how they have changed in the different populations that have been living under different environmental conditions.This research will help us to understand what genes are important for stress response in natural populations, and how they evolve in response to different environmental stress conditions. Many of the genes investigated here are involved in metabolism, diabetes and aging. Because animals share many of the same genes with only slight differences, experiments using snakes populations that naturally differ in reproduction, lifespan and stress response can help us to understand the genes responsible for these traits in many animal species, including livestock and humans.