Welcome to The Rand Lab at Brown University
Our Research:
We are interested in understanding how natural selection acts on genes and genomes. A major focus of the lab is to study the mitochondrial genome and its interactions with the nuclear genome, and how this interaction influences animal performance, evolutionary fitness, and aging. A second major interest is how environmental stressors influence the genetic composition of populations. The goals of our work are to identify the genetic interactions that allow organisms to adapt to environmental heterogeneity.
Research Foci:
Evolutionary Genetics of Mitochondria using Drosophila:
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Mitonuclear genetics of complex traits in Drosophila
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Mitonuclear coevolution, epistasis and fitness consequences
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Comparative transcriptomics and experimental evolution
Ecological Genomics:
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Northern Acorn Barnacle as a system to understand the genetics of adaptation to heterogeneous environments
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Reverse Ecology of host parasite interactions and microbial diversity
Recent Highlighted Research
PLOS GENETICS
Spierer AN, Mossman JA, Smith SP, Crawford L, Ramachandran S, Rand DM (2021) Natural variation in the regulation of neurodevelopmental genes modifies flight performance in Drosophila. PLoS Genet 17(3): e1008887. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgen.1008887
Nunez, JCBN et al. 2020. Footprints of natural selection at the mannose-6-phosphate isomerase locus in barnacles. The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (Paper)
Rand, DM and Mossman, JA. 2019. Mitonuclear conflict and cooperation govern the integration of genotypes, phenotypes and environments. The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society (Paper)
Laboratory News
Kim Neil has defended her dissertation
Congratulations to Dr. Neil!
Joaquin Nunez has defended his dissertation
Congratulations to Dr. Nunez!
Dr. Spierer awarded a 2020 Brown University Library Innovation Prize
Drawing on the rising importance of rigor and reproducibility of research, the Brown University Library announces up to $750 in prizes for a graduate student or undergraduate student publication, capstone paper, and/or thesis/dissertation or digital project incorporating innovation in rigor and transparency, in any field of research. $250 will be awarded for one project each from humanities, behavioral and social sciences, and life and physical sciences. The Carney Institute for Brain Science announces a parallel prize but independent undergraduate prize up to $750 for a capstone paper or thesis, within the general area of brain science, incorporating innovation in reproducibility.
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Recent Publications by Lab Members - Since 2015
February 25, 2020
Footprints of natural selection at the mannose-6-phosphate isomerase locus in barnacles
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
By Joaquin C. B. Nunez, Patrick A. Flight, Kimberly B. Neil, Stephen Rong, Leif A. Eriksson, David A. Ferranti, Magnus Alm Rosenblad, Anders Blomberg, and David M. Rand
January 01, 2020
Mitonuclear conflict and cooperation govern the integration of genotypes, phenotypes and environments
The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society
by David M Rand and Jim A Mossman
December 01, 2019
Mitochondrial genomic variation drives differential nuclear gene expression in discrete regions of Drosophila gene and protein interaction networks
BMC genomics
by Jim A Mossman, Leann M Biancani, David M Rand
February 11, 2019
Mitochondrial DNA fitness depends on nuclear genetic background in Drosophila
in G3: Genes, Genomes, Genetics
Jim A Mossman, Y Ge Jennifer, Freddy Navarro, David M Rand
February 27, 2019
Age of both parents influences reproduction and egg dumping behavior in Drosophila melanogaster
in Journal of Heredity
Jim A Mossman, Russyan Mark S Mabeza, Emma Blake, Neha Mehta, David M Rand
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