Rebecca Batstone

"Natural selection cannot possibly produce any modification in one species exclusively for the good of another species" - Darwin 1859

Welcome to my research page!

I am currently a PhD candidate in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology (EEB) at the University of Toronto. As a member of the Frederickson Lab (PI: Megan Frederickson, Associate Professor in EEB), I use the legume-rhizobium symbiosis as a model system to ask two main questions: i) how do symbiont preference traits evolve, and ii) how does variation in symbiont preference affect symbiont evolution and diversity? My PhD work thus far has involved numerous manipulative laboratory and field-based experiments, in addition to a collaborative synthesis chapter aiming to bridge mutualism evolution with community ecology.

An updated copy of my CV can be found here.

Updates:

Nov 2016: My lab mate Shannon and I are co-organizing a symposium at the upcoming CSEE 2017 meeting in Victoria, BC, entitled "Complex coevolution: understanding how coevolution may operate differently across diverse interaction types, systems, and scales". We have confirmed an awesome line-up of speakers, including: Jessica Forrest (UofO), Jeremy Yoder (UBC), Steve Perlman (UVic), Amanda Gibson (Emory), and Scott Nuismer (UIdaho). Note that the abstract submission deadline is soon approaching (March 1st), while the registration deadline is open until April 30th. I will post more details closer to the date!

Sept 2016: I am happy to announce that my first thesis chapter has been published in New Phytologist and is available online, so please check it out!