Publications
(In Preparation) Heritability and Phenotypic Plasticity of Body Size Morphology in the Parasitoid Wasp Dinocampus coccinellae
Dinocampus coccinellae (Hymenoptera:Braconidae, Euphorinae) is a solitary, generalist Braconid parasitoid wasp of over fifty species of coccinellid ladybeetles worldwide that reproduces through thelytokous parthenogenesis, an asexual process in which diploid daughters emerge from unfertilized eggs. The plethora of diverse body shapes and sizes across a range of host coccinellid beetles provide disparate environmental conditions for larval D. coccinellae to develop under, while the asexual nature of D. coccinellae offers the opportunity to examine the heritability of body size, and investigate plasticity or adaptive heritability of body size morphology. Here we utilized a common garden and reciprocal transplant experiment using parthenogenetic lines of D. coccinellae presented with three different host ladybeetle species of varying sizes, across multiple generations. Both unilineal ( = reared on same host species) and multilineal ( = reared on different host species) lines enabled total phenotypic variation to be quantified as a plastic and/or heritable trait. Since unilineal lines restrict environmental variation on clones, we expected positively correlated parent-offspring parasitoid regressions, indicative of heritable size variation. Whereas multilineal lines would quantify phenotypic plasticity of clones reared in varying environments, we expected negatively correlated parent-offspring parasitoid regressions.
(In Progress) A Population Genetics Analysis of the Invasive Ladybeetle Coccinella septempunctata
Dinocampus coccinellae (Hymenoptera:Braconidae, Euphorinae) is a solitary, generalist Braconid parasitoid wasp of over fifty species of coccinellid ladybeetles worldwide that reproduces through thelytokous parthenogenesis, an asexual process in which diploid daughters emerge from unfertilized eggs. The plethora of diverse body shapes and sizes across a range of host coccinellid beetles provide disparate environmental conditions for larval D. coccinellae to develop under, while the asexual nature of D. coccinellae offers the opportunity to examine the heritability of body size, and investigate plasticity or adaptive heritability of body size morphology. Here we utilized a common garden and reciprocal transplant experiment using parthenogenetic lines of D. coccinellae presented with three different host ladybeetle species of varying sizes, across multiple generations. Both unilineal ( = reared on same host species) and multilineal ( = reared on different host species) lines enabled total phenotypic variation to be quantified as a plastic and/or heritable trait. Since unilineal lines restrict environmental variation on clones, we expected positively correlated parent-offspring parasitoid regressions, indicative of heritable size variation. Whereas multilineal lines would quantify phenotypic plasticity of clones reared in varying environments, we expected negatively correlated parent-offspring parasitoid regressions.
(In Progress) A Population Genetics Analysis of the Invasive Ladybeetle Coccinella septempunctata
Presentations
Poster at 2022 Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minoritized Scientists
Oral Presentation at 2022 San Diego State University Undergraduate Research Symposium
Poster Presentation at 2021 San Diego State University Student Research Symposium