St. Mary
Colette M St. Mary
Professor and Associate Chair
Interests
Behavioral and evolutionary ecology; reproductive life history evolution (in particular, sex allocation and parental care); phenotypic plasticity; sexual selection; speciation; evolutionary aspects of cancer; marine fisheries management; reproduction and evolution in hatchery settings.
In a nutshell:
I am an evolutionary biologist; I seek to understand the forces of evolution, including the nature of selection, both natural and sexual, genetic drift, and mutation, including their consequences for phenotypic trait distributions. I typically focus on traits that contribute to reproductive life history, such as sex allocation, the size and number of offspring, and parental investment. However, I am also interested in aspects of phenotype that appear distinct from this, e.g., animal personality, domestication, and cancer incidence, although these too are actually strongly tied to life history. I primarily use fishes as my model organisms because of their great behavioral and reproductive diversity; however, I also collaborate on studies of other organisms. To accomplish my research goals I integrate field studies, laboratory experiments, and mathematical modeling approaches.