Karl H Grieshop ,
M.S in Biological Sciences at the University of Cincinnati
B.S. in Biological Sciences at the University of Cincinnati

Evolutionary Biology, Animal Behavior, Sexual Selection, Sexual Conflict
Adviser: Dr. Michal Polak

B.S. Biological Sciences : University of Cincinnati Cincinnati, Ohio, 2009 (Evolutionary Biology and Sexual Selection)

M.S. Biological Sciences: University of Cincinnati Cincinnati, Ohio, 2012 (Evolutionary Biology and Sexual Selection)

I am interested primarily in evolution.  Specifically, for my M.S., I used phenotypic manipulation and animal behavior to study the adaptive function of morphological traits in order to understand the selective pressures responsible for driving rapid evolutionary diversification.  I am especially interested in the genital traits of animals, because they are among the most rapidly diversifying types of traits in all of morphological evolution, yet still no one knows why.  My M.S. thesis research was on the adaptive function of male genital spines in the fruit fly D. ananassae, which turn out to promote male reproductive fitness by enhancing the efficiency with which males can couple the female genitalia to their own in a scramble competition mating system--details are published with more to come.  

Another closely related interest of mine (still concerned with evolutionary diversification) is in the origin of species: identifying and quantifying the variables responsible for the progress of reproductive isolation during speciation.  I have come to think of these variables as being, for the most part, selection on males and females that affects allele frequency and other genetic and genomic changes, which contribute to the progression of reproductive isolating mechanisms between populations.  This is a messy process to sort out, because there exists genetic conflict (i.e. different selection pressures operating on a common genome) between males and females, as well as between ploidal phases within individuals, which can influence the genetic change experienced under directional and/or disruptive selection that might otherwise promote reproductive isolation and, ultimately, speciation.  

I have completed my M.S. here at U.C. and will be at Uppsala University in Sweden starting October 2012 to do my Ph.D. with Göran Arnqvist.  I will always maintain the email address: karlgrieshop@gmail.com 

2009 -2012 M.S. Student, Research Scientist and Teaching Assistant, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio

Peer Reviewed Publications

Grieshop, K. & Polak, M. 2012. The precopulatory function of male genital spines in Drosophila ananassae [Doleschall] (Diptera: Drosophilidae) revealed by laser surgery. Evolution. (doi: 10.1111/j.1558-5646.2012.01638.x).