I have an interdisciplinary background in development, physics, and evolution of animal coloration. My research has always been in the field of evolutionary developmetal biology (evo-devo), with a focus on identifying genes involved in colour pattern variation and evolution in various animals.
Keywords
Evo-devo, colour patterns, polymorphism, genomics, supergenes
I received my PhD from Leiden University, where I investigated the genetic basis of variation in butterfly wing patterns. During my first postdoc at the University of Geneva I worked closely with physicists and computer scientists to study the genetic and physical mechanisms that generate complex colour traits in lizards and snakes. I then went back to studying butterflies at the Museum of Natural History in Paris, where I investigated the genetic architecture of the wing colour supergene in Heliconius numata. My interest in supergenes brought me back to the Netherlands where I now work on the shell colour polymorphism supergene in the snail Cepaea nemoralis.