Comparative Phylogeography and Molecular Evolution of Australian Eugongylinae Skink

As a student in a life science campus in Indonesia, getting an opportunity to broaden your network by doing collaborative research overseas is a blessing. One type of such is the Future Research Talent (FRT) awards from the Australian National University (ANU). The FRT is a competitive and prestigious program held by ANU College of Science which only accepts the best staff members and students from top tier Indonesian institutions. Being an awardee for FRT means we can develop your research skills and broaden our network in one of the best universities in the world, ANU!

This year, one of our BioInformatics students, Jeremias Ivan from cohort 2016, is one of the awardees of the prestigious award. He will be working under the supervision of Prof. Craig Moritz and his team at the Evolutionary Biogeography and Conservation Group, Division of Ecology and Evolution, Research School of Biology. Prof. Craig Moritz is one of the leading experts in biodiversity and evolutionary biology in Australia with decades of experience in the field.

Ivan’s project is all about skinks and evolution. He will utilize the exon-capture data of southern Morethia species to assess its phylogeography and range expansion evidence of the species in relation to historical habitat stability and current climatic limits of species. Furthermore, he and Prof. Moritz’s team will incorporate 22 other genera from the Eugongylus group to validate the Metabolic Ecology theory, where mutation rate (and substitution rate if neutral theory is used) positively correlates with temperature. Sounds like a big project to do!

Good luck, Ivan! For those who wish to follow Ivan’s footsteps, keep on keeping on!