Welcome
I am an evolutionary biologist interested in building and deciphering the tree of life. My research integrates data from natural history, ecology, genomics, and paleontology—often through the application of novel computation tools—in order to understand the links between micro- and macroevolution.
I am currently supported by an Eric and Wendy Schmidt AI in Science Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Michigan.
Recent News
3rd Joint Congress on Evolutionary Biology
July 30, 2024 - Jake attended the 3rd Joint Congress on Evolutionary Biology in Montreal, QC, Canada, where he gave a talk on his research into applications of computer vision to studies of bird skeleton evolution. His talk, titled (in jest) '15,000 Skeletons, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Phenotype', was recorded and is available on YouTube here
Genome and life-history evolution link bird diversification to the end-Cretaceous mass extinction
August 01, 2024 - The primary work from Jake's first postdoc is now published as the cover article in Science Advances. In this study, Jake examined how bird genomes evolved after the end-Cretaceous mass extinction 66 million years ago. By analyzing different genetic regions, Jake and his team identified key shifts in DNA sequences linked to changes in development, body size, and metabolism. These findings suggest that the mass extinction played a crucial role in shaping the evolution and early diversification of modern birds.
The site’s banner is a portion of Salvador Dali’s “Persistence of Memory.” Dawn Adès wrote, “The soft watches are an unconscious symbol of the relativity of space and time, a Surrealist meditation on the collapse of our notions of a fixed cosmic order.” In evolutionary biology, time is often relative and (outside of paleontology) rarely absolute. Dalí’s olive tree with its cut branches, overlain by time, is a reminder of the challenges we face in understanding the tree of life. To the top left, an allusion to Charles Darwin’s note, “I think”, from his famous illustration of a phylogenetic tree.