THOMAS J. DeWITT

Associate Professor
Plant Pathology and Microbiology, Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences

Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences
Texas A&M University
TAMU 2258
College Station, TX 77843-2258
Office: Nagle Hall (map)
Phone: 979.458.1684
Fax: 979.845.4096
E-mail: tdewitt@tamu.edu
Department Web page

Keywords: Ecological mechanisms of evolutionary diversification, evolutionary theory, predation ecology, biometry, phenotypic plasticity, animal behavior, environmental stochasticity, aquatic ecology, morphometrics

Interests:
I study ecological mechanisms that drive evolutionary diversification. These studies typically involve aquatic invertebrates and fish, although through collaboration I also work on fungi, drosophila and amphibian larvae. Surprisingly, there exists little adequately detailed or integrative work on divergent natural selection, which I consider to be the most important topic in evolutionary and conservation biology.

My research aims to help fill the void by identifying mechanisms that drive evolution within, and diversification or convergence between natural populations. My interests center on natural selection, which necessitates a distinctly functional ecological approach as the core of nearly all projects in my lab. Yet to be of broad impact, ecology must be broadly integrative. Thus I incorporate relevant aspects of genetics (molecular and quantitative), physiology (internal mechanisms of accommodation), developmental biology (phenotypic plasticity), population biology (phenotypic and genetic structure) and community ecology. I embrace biological complexity. This philosophy requires use of model empirical systems (weed species) and often depends on theoretical modeling to flesh out new ideas. Its like Darwin said: "There is grandeur in this view of life."

Disciplines: Behavioral Ecology, Conservation Biology, Evolutionary & Population Genetics

Courses:
GENE 612: Population Genetics
WFSC 622: Behavioral Ecology

Selected publications:
Langerhans RB, Layman CA, DeWitt TJ (2005) Male genital size reflects a tradeoff between attracting mates and avoiding predators in two livebearing fish species. Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. USA 102: 7618-7623.

Ruehl CB, DeWitt TJ (2005) Trophic plasticity and fine-grained resource variation in populations of western mosquitofish, Gambusia affinis. Evolutionary Ecology Research 7: 801-819.

Langerhans RB, Layman CA, Shokrollahi AM, DeWitt TJ (2004) Predator-driven phenotypic diversification in Gambusia affinis. Evolution 58: 2305–2318.

Langerhans RB, DeWitt TJ (2004) Shared and unique features of evolutionary diversification. American Naturalist 164: 335-349.

DeWitt TJ, Scheiner SM, Eds. (2004) Phenotypic Plasticity. Functional and Conceptual Approaches. New York: Oxford University Press.