Experimental studies of learning evolution: the role of reliability and uncertainty

This project will study how natural selection shapes animal learning abilities. It will manipulate two theoretically important attributes of a simplified 'environment' across many generations. The project will ask whether these environmental differences lead to enhanced or reduced learning abilities in populations of the fruit fly (Drosophila). Learning is a basic mechanism of both human and non-human behavior, and investigators have long believed that changing environments select for learning abilities. It has been difficult, however, to test claims like this because it is hard to measure or control 'environmental change' over evolutionary time. This research will use novel techniques to control environmental change over many generations and it will test hypotheses about the properties of change that select both for and against learning abilities. It is expected that this project will generate lines of fruit flies (Drosophila) with varying degrees of learning ability, and that these lines of flies will be useful for further study of the physiological basis of learning ability. It is important to understand variation in learning abilities for several practical reasons. First, it will help us manage populations in changing environments (for example, in changing climates) and it furthers our understanding of variation in human learning abilities. This project will provide hands on research experience for at least nine undergraduate students.