Ann Willyard, Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow,
Biology Department
Churchill-Haines Laboratories:
Lab Room 177A; Herbarium Room 168
Lab Phone: (605) 677-6178
Research interests:
I am interested in the evolutionary relationships among young plant species, i.e. those sister species that still retain and share ancestral polymorphism. A number of factors can contribute to a lack of genetic coalescence, such as recent divergence, abundant within-species variation, and reticulate evolution. The relative contribution of various factors can be evaluated by integrating several traditional approaches. As an example, the pairing of a careful review of fossil literature with a molecular phylogeny suggests that many lineages in the genus Pinus arose in the rather recent past. In another approach, combined evidence from two independent nuclear phylogenies, chloroplast haplotypes, and the sampling of population-level allele frequencies and genetic admixture provide evidence for current introgression among pine species as well as a possible footprint of ancient reticulate evolution.
My current research in the Nepokroeff lab
lab uses the Hawaiian endemic genus Schiedea (Caryophyllaceae). The 33
extant Schiedea species exhibit an exceptionally diverse pattern of
breeding systems, habitats, and growth forms. We are applying coalescent-based
approaches to these young species to create a phylogenetic framework in which
to study the interactions between the shifts in sexual dimorphism and shifts in
habitats on an evolutionary timescale.
Academic:
Ph.D. (Botany)
M.S. (Botany) With
Distinction,
B.A. (Biology)
Contributed Talks:
2007:
Botanical Society of America,
2006: Botanical
Society of America,
2006: Evolution,
2005: Western
Forest Genetics Association,
2005:
Botanical Society of America,
2000:
Plant and Animal Genome VIII,
Publications:
Willyard, Ann, John Syring, David Gernandt, Aaron Liston, and Richard Cronn. Fossil calibration of molecular divergence in Pinus: inferences for ages and mutation rates. Mol Biol Evol 2007:24:90-101.
Syring, John, Ann Willyard, Richard Cronn, and Aaron Liston. 2005. Evolutionary relationships among Pinus (Pinaceae) subsections inferred from multiple low-copy nuclear loci. Am J Bot 2005 92: 2086-2100.
Liston, Aaron; Mariah Parker-Defeniks, John V. Syring, Ann Willyard, and Richard Cronn. Interspecific phylogenetic analysis enhances intraspecific phylogeographic inference: A case study in Pinus lambertiana Mol Ecol 2007 16:3926–3937.
Links:
Pine Phylogeny Folks:
Richard
Cronn (
Aaron Liston (
John Syring (
David Gernandt (Instituto de Biologia, UNAM)
Oregon
Plant Atlas “The Oregon Plant Atlas is an on-line resource for displaying
distributions of plants growing without cultivation in
Gymnosperm ATOL “Current hypotheses of seed plant relationships remain controversial and have been inferred from very limited sampling, while very few molecular phylogenetic studies at the species level have been conducted in gymnosperms. Our results will address questions at all levels and will provide the comparative morphological data from across ALL gymnosperms necessary for a full exploration of the positions of extinct and living taxa in the Tree Of Life.”
Dendrome “Dendrome is a collection of forest tree genome databases and other forest genetic information resources for the international forest genetics community. Dendrome is part of a larger collaborative effort to construct genome databases for major crop and forest species.”
The Native Plant Society of Oregon
“Dedicated to the enjoyment, conservation, and study of
California Native
Plant Society Shasta Chapter “Shasta Chapter promotes appreciation for