Research Symposium

BIO

I am a freshman in the Honors Program at Florida State University, majoring in Biology with a minor in Chemistry on the pre-medical track. I am passionate about scientific research and currently work as a research assistant in the Lemmon Lab within the biology department. Outside of academics, I serve as the Community Service Coordinator for Sigma Delta Tau and am an active member of the medical fraternity Phi Delta Epsilon. Additionally, I have experience working and volunteering in hospital settings with both adult and pediatric patients. In the future, I plan to attend medical school to pursue a career in neurosurgery. To prepare for this path, I am actively seeking opportunities to gain research, clinical, and volunteer experience.

Comparing Within Vs. Between Individual Mating Call Variation in Upland Chorus Frog (Pseudacris feriarum) Population

Abstract

A primary goal of evolutionary biology is to understand the forces driving the generation of Earth’s biodiversity through speciation. Reinforcement—the evolution of behavioral reproductive isolation due to selection against hybridization—is one such force that can contribute to speciation by reducing interbreeding between closely related species. It can also indirectly cause divergence in mating behaviors within a species, leading to reproductive isolation among populations. Chorus frogs (genus Pseudacris) provide a model for studying reinforcement, as male acoustic signals and female mating preferences have evolved in response to species overlap. The Upland chorus frog (P. feriarum) exhibits call divergence between populations that do and do not overlap with the Southern chorus frog (P. nigrita). However, it remains unknown whether P. feriarum individuals with extreme call phenotypes recognize each other as the same species or if they have become behaviorally isolated, representing an incipient new species. To investigate this, we studied a population of P. feriarum near Macon, Georgia, where individuals exhibit a broad range of call phenotypes. Specifically, we examined whether pulse rate (PR) and pulse number (PN) vary more among individuals than within individuals. We predicted that if extreme call phenotypes indicate reproductive isolation, call variation among individuals would exceed variation within individuals. We analyzed 400 frog calls, with 20 calls per frog, to assess this. Our findings contribute to understanding how reproductive behaviors evolve through reinforcement and their role in driving speciation.

Keywords: Reinforcement, Speciation, Divergence, Evolution, Acoustic Signaling