We study the genetic basis of biodiversity.

Aedes albopictus

Can transposable elements supply the mutations that let an invading mosquito adapt this fast?

More than half of the tiger mosquito genome is transposable elements. We are mapping the TE landscape across the Culicidae and in natural populations, and testing in the lab whether thermal stress mobilises them.

Formica paralugubris

What happened to the wood ants moved from the Alps to the Apennines for pest control?

We are sequencing individuals from the native and introduced ranges, plus historical specimens from the translocation experiments, to read the evolution of this species in space and time.

Drosophilidae · Tephritidae · Glossina

Which genes underlie the remarkable diversity of Diptera biology?

Using the growing pile of public genomic data, we follow chemosensory genes and opsins across fruit flies, true fruit flies and tse-tse flies — several of them pests and disease vectors of global importance.

Botryllus schlosseri

Can a mutation in a single cell be selected across an entire colony?

We deep-sequence laboratory-reared colonies of a colonial tunicate to test whether selection or somatic drift raises the frequency of somatic mutations — and whether they reach the next generation.