Siyang Xia

My main research interest lies in animal behavior and behavioral ecology. I am interested in questions like how behaviors mediate an organism’s adaptations to the environment, what are the roles of behaviors in generating biological diversity, and how behaviors are inherited and modified through evolution. In my dissertation research, I use the yellow fever mosquito Aedes aegypti as a model system and study the evolution of its oviposition behaviors. The mosquitoes invaded human-made domestic habitats from the forest in the last millennium. During this domestication process, they switched from using natural containers to artificial containers as their main egg-laying sites. Through field characterization of natural oviposition sites, laboratory behavioral experiments and population genetic analysis, I am investigating what modifications of the oviposition behaviors were involved in this habitat switch and what might be the environmental conditions that drove the behavioral modifications and the genetic basis of these modifications. In addition to Ae. aegypti behavioral evolution, I am also interested in mosquito control. Using a series of coupled genetic-demographic model, I am examining the efficacy of “genetic shifting” as a novel mosquito control approach, which involves selective breeding and releases of resistant mosquitoes.