Reconstructing monarch’s evolutionary history in vivo using CRISPR flies!

I am super proud to report that Amy Hastings and I have been part of a wonderful collaboration with Noah Whiteman’s and Susanne Dobler’s labs reconstructing the evolutionary history of genetic changes in monarch butterflies experimentally (and in vivo) using fruit flies. You can read the paper, just published in Nature here.

Lots is being written about it, including the excellent Backstory and history in Noah’s words, an article in the NY Times by Carl Zimmer, Berkeley press release, Perspective in Science, Cornell Press release, and a post on SciGlo.

Also, listen to a new hour-long podcast about all-things monarch, from their coevolutionary dynamics with milkweed, their conservation, and the new CRISPR monarch-fly discoveries mentioned above.