Dr. Matthew Josephson

My general research interests include evolutionary genetics and genomics and developing novel techniques to study evolutionary processes. In the Evolutionary Ecology group I focus on studying the evolution of sex chromosomes. In particular I take advantage of the sex chromosome-autosome fusions that are found in a few species of stickleback fish. These neo-Y chromosomes still recombine with the X, which provides a unique opportunity to study the progression of recombination suppression, sexually antagonistic selection, and evolution of sex determining regions. 

I also am developing tools to help answer an important question in evolutionary biology: what are the exact genetic changes that drive phenotypic changes? Many studies that map quantitative trait loci (QTL) fail to find the specific genes or mutations underlying phenotypic changes. Advances in genome editing technologies present an opportunity to change that trend. Our group and others have mapped several traits (schooling behavior, armor plates, neuromast number) to the Eda locus. To identify the causative mutations in this locus, I am developing techniques to use precise genome engineering to test specific polymorphisms for their role in these evolutionarily important phenotypes.