My job is to suss out how the Hawai'ian Wikstroemia species are related, how they spread across the islands, what their population structure is like across various habitats, and how the gene trees of the sex-determining regions line up with the evolutionary history of the taxa we recognise today.

We investigate these emergent sexual systems through field sampling, greenhouse crosses, hybridisation trials, GWAS, and various other genomic methods for identifying sex chromosomes. However, we also use phylogenetics, biogeographic analyses, and population genetics. This is where I come in.

Since the Wikstroemia colonised Hawai'i less than 10 mya, several lineages have (seemingly independently) made the transition from ancestral hermaphroditism to dioecy. This makes these plants a perfect system for study of recent evolution of sex – a subject we still know surprisingly little about.

In Hawai'i we find a dozen endemic species of the Wikstroemia genus of flowering plants. Traditionally, native Hawaiians used the tough bark to make cordage, the red berries to decorate lei, and the pulped flesh to make a fish-stunning toxin to be dropped into tide pools.

Including a full house of evolutionary biologists!

Festa de Gràcia!

Great first three days of ESEB @eseb2025.bsky.social

Many great talks, many great posters, lots and lots of great evolutionary biology.

Also many new followers! I will post a proper introduction once the conference is over, but for now: hello!

And of course... sometimes you get to have a volcano in the background.

If I wasn't already tied up with a different plant, I'm not sure I could resist falling headfirst in love with the ʻōhiʻa lehua. Not only do they pop up out of the lava rock like it's nothing, they also have such amazing blossoms!

Don't look at the view, look at these plants! 🌿

You looked at them? You sure? Fine. Now you can look at the view. ⛰️

#fieldwork #botany #hawaii

Native Hawaiian Plants course excursion. Lots of plants, lots of rain, enthusiastic grad students, great views, and flowering Wikstroemia to sample.

Tester Memorial Symposium at the School of Life Sciences, UHM.

Learned a lot about marine biology around the Pacific, and a little bit about terrestial stuff too. An important theme in "Hoʻokele ʻIke: Navigating Knowledge in Life Sciences", a wonderful end banquet, and a great experience overall!

From this week and three months onward I am in Hawai'i for #fieldwork and collaboration. Currently getting myself acquainted with Honolulu.

My first proper botanical field work! Good to see the results are finally out. Here are some pictures from my (very minor) contribution 🌱

Beautiful Český Krumlov 🏰☀️ One week left of Population and Speciation Genomics @wpsg.bsky.social @evomics.bsky.social