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I study the roles that symbiotic microorganisms play in the ecology and evolution of insects.
I'm particularly interested in microbial symbionts that form part of an insect's resistance against attack by natural enemies. These defensive interactions take place within a natural community containing many different players, and I seek to understand how that community context interacts with the symbiosis. How are ecological communities structured by the microbes hidden within animals? Reciprocally, how is that symbiotic community impacted by the external ecology community?
Understanding natural ecology can also help us to tackle questions surrounding the evolution of symbiotic interactions. How do symbionts influence the specialisation and potentially speciation of insects? What drives the variation we observe in symbiont function, both within and between symbiont species?
To answer these questions, I use laboratory and field experiments with insect model systems, mainly aphids and their natural enemies.
