Alexandra (Sasha) Pavlova

Ability of individuals to disperse though the landscape underline population health, thus maintaining connectivity for broad-scale ecological processes like dispersal and gene flow is vital for conserving species in fragmented landscapes. Our project Birds in fragmented landscapes aims to estimate whether structurally fragmented populations of several bird species are functionally connected via dispersal. Using molecular tools, such as microsatellite genotyping and SNPs, we will quantify the movement within and among landscapes which will enable us to identify landscape features that promote natural population functions at patch, landscape and bioregional scales. We will compare dispersal abilities and population trajectories among species that have contrasting responses to landscape-level habitat loss and develop predictive models to inform land managers on the optimal strategies of land management and habitat reconstruction.

Molecular techniques provide a powerful tool in discovering patterns of historical population processes, connectivity via gene flow, population dynamics on different timescales, and evolutionary history. My comparative phylogeography work in collaboration with Dr. Robert Zink (University of Minnesota) and Dr. Sievert Rohwer (University of Washington) involves analysis of mitochondrial DNA sequences to explore patterns of recent evolution and post-Pleistocene re-colonisation for co-distributed widespread Eurasian birds. We find that most Eurasian birds display phylogeographic structure consistent with past isolation. In some species lineages have been isolated for a long time and appear to represent different phylogenetic species, whereas in others isolated clades appear to have expanded towards each other and merge.