Dr Isobel Eyres

School of Biosciences

Research Fellow

Dr Isobel Eyres
Profile picture of Dr Isobel Eyres
i.eyres@sheffield.ac.uk

Full contact details

Dr Isobel Eyres
School of Biosciences
Alfred Denny Building
Western Bank
Sheffield
S10 2TN
Profile
  • Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Fellow, University of Sheffield (2022-present)
  • Postdoctoral Research Associate, Butlin Lab, University of Sheffield (2014-2021)
  • PhD, Imperial College London (2010-2014)
  • BA Biological Sciences, University of Oxford (2004-2007)
Research interests
  • The genomics of population divergence and speciation
  • Speciation in facultative sexuals
  • Experimental speciation in the lab using monogonont rotifers

I am an evolutionary biologist interested in the evolution of reproductive isolation. My research primarily focusses on the impact of sex and gene flow on the processes of adaptation and speciation.

What makes speciation more or less likely to occur? Each speciation event is unique, taking place with a different set of organisms with a different evolutionary history and a different set of environmental circumstances. The evolutionary forces experienced by populations during the speciation process will influence its outcome. Understanding the impact of these forces helps to explain the patterns of biodiversity we see around us.

A wealth of reproductive modes exist across the tree of life, from complete asexuality to obligate bisexual reproduction. A facultatively sexual reproductive mode, in which species reproduce both sexually and asexually, is common in fungi, plants and animals, and is found in ecologically and economically important groups including disease causing organisms, crop pests and primary producers. However, important questions such as how local adaptation and reproductive isolation evolve in the presence of gene flow, and how this impacts the genome, are yet to be asked of facultative sexuals.

To answer these questions I combine studies of natural populations with experimental speciation and genomics.

Publications

Journal articles