Department of Biology

Program

Evolution, Ecology & Behavior

Research Areas

• Behavior
• Developmental Mechanisms and Regulation in Eukaryotic Systems
• Evolution
• Genomics and Bioinformatics

Education

1996 M.S., Julius Maximilians University, Wuerzburg, Germany
2002 Ph.D., Duke University
2002-04 NIH Postdoctoral Excellence in Research & Teaching Fellow, University of Arizona

Awards

2004 Young Investigator Prize, American Society of Naturalists
2007 & 2008 Indiana University Trustees’ Teaching Award
2010/11 Long-Term Sabbatical Fellow National Evolutionary Synthesis Center

Research Description

Our lab addresses a fundamental question in biology: how do novel phenotypic traits originate and diversify in nature? We use a wide range of approaches to address this question from different perspectives, and on different levels of biological organization. We use behavioral and ecological approaches in the lab and field on experimental and natural populations to understand when and how ecological processes can drive phenotypic evolution. We employ standard developmental techniques and growth manipulations to address physiological mechanisms of phenotype formation and evolution. Lastly, we rely on an increasing range of developmental-genetic and molecular tools (gene expression, gene function analysis, genomic and proteomic approaches) to investigate the genetic and genomic regulation of phenotype expression and diversification.

While each of these approaches has provided valuable insights, it has been most of all the integration across these levels of analyses that has proven most informing and fascinating.

Our study organisms have been primarily beetles in the genus Onthophagus. We have also begun to address related questions in other organisms, in particular the beetle family Lampyridae (fireflies, lightening bugs) and Drosophila, and are open to add additional organisms to our repertoire.

The Moczek laboratory offers a wide range of opportunities for postgraduate, graduate and undergraduate research in Evolution, Development and Ecology. At the same time this lab is part of one of the strongest and most diverse Biology Departments with a stellar record in integrative, crossdisciplinary work. If you are interested in joining this lab please contact Armin Moczek (armin(at) indiana.edu).

Select Publications

Snell-Rood, E. C., A. Cash, M. V. Han, T. Kijimoto, A. Andrews, and A. P. Moczek 2011. Developmental decoupling of alternative phenotypes: insights from the transcriptomes of horn-polyphenic beetles. Evolution, 65: 231-245.

Wasik B, Moczek AP in press. decapentaplegic (dpp) regulates the growth of a morphological novelty, beetle horns. Development, Genes and Evolution, in press.

Simonnet F, Moczek AP in press. Conservation and diversification of gene function during mouthpart development in Onthophagus beetles. Evolution & Development, in press

Moczek AP 2010. Phenotypic plasticity and diversity in insects. In From polyphenism to complex metazoan life cycles, edited by A. Minelli, G Fusco Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B 365: 593-603.

Kijimoto T, Costello J, Tang Z, Moczek AP, Andrews J 2009. EST and microarray analysis of horn development in Onthophagus beetles. BMC Genomics 2009, 10:504.

Wasik BR, Rose DJ, Moczek AP 2010. Beetle horns are regulated by the Hox gene, Sex combs reduced, in a species- and sex-specific manner. Evolution & Development 12: 353-362.

Kijimoto T, Andrews J, Moczek AP 2010. Programmed cell death shapes the expression of horns within and between species of horned beetles. Evolution & Development, 12: 449-458.

Choi J-H, Kijimoto T, Snell-Rood EC, Tae H, Yang Y-I, Moczek AP, Andrews J. 2010. Gene discovery in the horned beetle Onthophagus taurus. BMC Genomics 11:703.

Pfennig D, Wund MA, Snell-Rood EC, Cruickshank T, Schlichting CD, Moczek AP 2010. Phenotypic plasticity's impacts on diversification and speciation. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 25: 459-467.

Snell-Rood EC, VanDyken JD, Cruickshank TE, Wade MJ, Moczek AP 2010. Toward a population genetic framework of developmental evolution: costs, limits, and consequences of phenotypic plasticity. Bioessays 32: 71-81.

Moczek AP, Rose, DJ 2009. Differential recruitment of limb patterning genes during development and diversification of beetle horns. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 106: 8992-8997.

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