Current Lab Members

P.I.

Dr. Lindsey R. Leighton

U of A Faculty website: https://www.ualberta.ca/science/about-us/contact-us/faculty-directory/lindsey-leighton

Graduate Students

Darrin Molinaro (Ph.D. candidate)

IMG_1326 (683x1024)My PhD thesis focuses on examining the effects of morphological (shape) variation on extinction, specifically if increased shape variation promotes survivorship. In order to accomplish this I’m investigating both Devonian Brachiopods and Neogene Bivalves (clams) of North America. If similar trends are found for both distinct taxa, times, and places it may be possible to use shape variation as a means of monitoring taxa during the ongoing biodiversity crisis.

Beyond my PhD thesis I’m also interested in functional morphology, biomechanics, predator prey interactions, and 3D data acquisition (scanning) and replication (printing).

Kristina Barclay (Ph.D.)

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I finished my Ph.D. in the Leighton lab in early 2020. My dissertation examined the effects of ocean acidification on biotic interactions, such as those between predators and prey, both in the modern and fossil record.  I recently returned from conducting a long-term growth experiment on two species of gastropod (snail), exposing them to predator cues and acidic water conditions, at Bodega Marine Laboratory (UC Davis) with the Bodega Ocean Acidification Research (BOAR) group.

Check out my website, publications, and science blog: kristinabarclay.wordpress.com

Follow me on ResearchGate and Twitter.

Steven Mendonca (M.Sc. student)

My Master’s thesis integrates observations from the modern and the fossil record to make inferences on predator-prey interactions in deep time. I am using crushing repair scars to look at changes in predator prey dynamics through time during a period of great turnover in shell-crushing predators. In order to understand these repair scars in the fossil record, I am examining modern predator-prey interactions in arena experiments and to identify relationships between predator and prey size with success rates in encounters.

Rylan Dievert (M.Sc. student)

During the courses of my Master’s thesis I will be examining productide brachiopod evolution. To do so I will be making physical models and performing hydrodynamic tests to evaluate multiple aspects of productide functional morphology and then applying the observations in a phylogenetic context. Because productides lacked pedicles, valve and spine morphology were critical to preventing transport and enhancing feeding efficiency. My goal is to detect and compare trends in the functional performance of different lineages.

Claudia Selles (M.Sc. student)

My Master’s thesis focuses on the latitudinal gradient in predation patterns in the Devonian period. I am using repair scars from several species of fossil brachiopods found across North America to determine if there was a gradient in failed attack rates, and examining what morphological features, such as ornamentation and convexity, may have influenced that gradient. As North America was located south of the equator in the Devonian, the paleo-latitudes of the specimens used range from equatorial to temperate.

Undergraduate Students

Matthew Pruden

Matt Pruden Geo_Field_School

I am a fifth year undergraduate student at the University of Alberta, specializing in paleontology. My research focuses on paleoecology and conservation paleobiology. I completed three NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Awards over the past couple years covering topic in predation, species modelling, and spatial ecology.  Currently, I am doing an undergraduate thesis with Dr. Leighton where I will continue to explore problems in conservation paleobiology.

Caroline Sinclair

I have just completed my Undergraduate degree at the U of A, double majoring in Biological Sciences and Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. I absolutely love arthropods and have been lucky enough to work on projects ranging from snail preference in modern crabs (like “the Beast” featured here), to durophagous arthropods of the mid-Paleozoic. I hope to be able to gain the skills and experience needed to make myself an efficient science communicator and to promote collaboration within the different disciplines of science.

Collaborators

Dr. Chris Schneider

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