I joined the Indian Institute of Science for my doctoral degree at the Centre for Ecological Sciences in the year 2006. My primary interest is in molecular systematics, evolutionary biology and biogeography.

My doctoral research aims to resolve the molecular phylogeny and to understand biogeography of a centipede family – Scolopendridae. Scolopendridae is a diverse and cosmopolitan centipede family with most of its diversity concentrated in the tropics.

Peninsular India offers a unique setting to test the influence of the ecological, historical and geographic factors on the phylogeographic structure of the taxa. Six out of nine species of Digitipes (Scolopendridae) are endemic to peninsular India. Therefore, I am analyzing phylogeographic patterns of these six endemic species.

Rohini Bansal

Email: rohini_bansal@ces.iisc.ernet.in

I am in CES since 2006 pursuing doctoral research at Dr. Praveen Karanth’s Lab. I am working on the phylogeny and biogeography of Hemidactylus geckos of India. I am interested in colonisation history and phylogeography of geckos in relation to Human mediated gene flow.

Sandhya Sekar

Email: sandhya@ces.iisc.ernet.in,

sandysek@gmail.com

I joined the Ph.D. program in August 2007. The broad topic of my PhD is “the effect of life history traits on the phylogeographic patterns of butterflies”.

I first did a meta-analysis to figure out what factors affect dispersal propensity in butterflies. The factors I have considered are species specific ecological, morphological and life history traits that can affect dispersal ability.

The main component of my PhD is a molecular study that will test the results of this meta analyses using pairs of butterfly species of the sub-Family Satyrinae, that differ in a particular trait. I am looking at two traits: body size, with the expectation that the larger species will fly greater distances and have a more uniform genetic structure; and habitat specificity, with the expectation that a habitat specialist will have a genetic pattern congruent with sampling locations. I am using the technique of Amplified Fragment Length Polymorphism (AFLP), which gives the resolution necessary to study fine scale genetic patterns.

Ishan Agarwal

Email: ishan@ces.iisc.ernet.in

I’ve been at CES since 2008. My primary interests are in taxonomy, species distributions and biogeography. I’m also an amateur wildlife photographer who loves to travel, and eat.

My PhD research is on the biogeography, diversification and systematics of the genus Geckoella (Squamata: Gekkonidae). I plan to integrate molecular phylogenetics and species distribution modeling along with more traditional taxonomic work. My main questions concern the evolutionary origin of Geckoella and diversification within this group.