Welcome to my corner of the web. Here you'll find information on my research, some useful links, and my CV. Please feel free to email me at Alex_Wong@carleton.ca Research My research is focused on the genetic causes and consequences of biological adapation. Thus, I am interested both in describing the molecular basis of adaptive phenotypes, and in understanding the potentially non-adaptive consequences of natural selection. Evolutionary biologists have long been preoccupied with understanding the origins and maintenance of biological diversity. Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection outlines the basic processes giving rise to biodiversity, and over the past 150 years theoretical and empirical work has refined and expanded Darwin's initial offerings. In the last 20 or so years, empirical research on natural selection has made stunning advances on a number of fronts. Phenotype-centered studies have quantified the frequency and strength of selection in the lab and in the wild, and have shed light on a wide variety of important issues, such as the roles of epistasis and pleiotropy in determining the course of evolution. In addition, using statistical and computational tools, we can infer the consequences of historical natural selection from population genetic and comparative genomic data. Unfortunately, these broad programs of study – focused on phenotypes and genotypes, respectively – have often been pursued in isolation, although recently much effort has gone into uniting the two approaches. In my own work, I aim to bridge the phenotype-genotype gap by investigating the genetic consequences of selection. I am interested both in characterizing the direct genetic targets of selection, and in studying the indirect effects of selection throughout the genome. In pursuit of these aims, I use a wide variety of tools, including the computational analysis of population genetic and comparative genomic data, experimental evolution, and molecular genetics. Currently, I am pursuing two main research projects – an experimental evolutionary study of antibiotic resistance in the opportunistic pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and computational analysis of the consequences of sperm competition on mammalian substitution rates. Please click on the links below for more information.
Genomic consequences of sperm competition  Professional and educational experience I am currently a Banting research fellow at Carleton University, and will be starting as an assistant professor in July 2013. Previously I was a post-doc in the Department of Biology at the University of Ottawa, working with Rees Kassen and Howard Rundle. In 2008 I completed a PhD in Genetics and Development at Cornell University with Chip Aquadro and Mariana Wolfner, where I worked on the molecular evolution of reproductive proteins in Drosophila melanogaster and its relatives. Selected Publications For a full list, please see my CV. Wong A, Kassen R.2011. Parallel evolution and local differentiation in quinolone resistance in Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Microbiology epub Feb 3. Wong A. 2010. Testing the effects of mating system variation on rates of molecular evolution in primates. Evolution 64: 2779-85. Wong A, Christopher AB, Buehner NA, Wolfner MF. 2010. Immortal coils: Conserved dimerization motifs of the Drosophila egg-laying prohormone ovulin. Insect Biochemistry and Molecular Biology 40: 303-10. Wong A*, Albright SN*, Giebel J, Kristipati RR, Ji S, Fiumera AC, Wolfner MF. 2008. A role for Acp29AB, a predicted seminal fluid lectin, in female sperm storage in Drosophila melanogaster. Genetics 180: 921-31. Demogines A, Wong A, Aquadro CF, Alani E. 2008. Incompatibilities involving yeast mismatch repair genes: a role for genetic modifiers and implications for disease penetrance and variation in genomic mutation rates. PLoS Genetics 4: e1000103. Larracuente AM, Sackton TB, Greenberg AJ, Wong A, Singh ND, Sturgill D, Zhang Y, Oliver B, Clark AG. 2008. Evolution of protein-coding genes in Drosophila. Trends in Genetics 24:114-23. Wong A, Turchin MC, Wolfner MF, Aquadro CF. 2008. Evidence for positive selection on Drosophila melanogaster seminal fluid protease homologs. Molecular Biology and Evolution 25: 497-506. Epub. 2007 Dec 4. Drosophila 12 Genomes Consortium. 2007. Evolution of Genes and Genomes on the Drosophila Phylogeny. Nature 450: 203-18. Haerty S, Jagadeeshan S, Kulathinal R, Wong A, Ravi Ram K, Sirot LK, Levesque L, Artieri C, Wolfner MF, Civetta A, Singh R. 2007. Evolution in the fast lane: rapidly evolving sex-and reproduction-related genes in species of the genus Drosophila. Genetics 177: 1321-35. Jensen JD, Wong A, Aquadro CF. 2007. On statistical and functional approaches for identifying targets of positive selection. Trends in Genetics 23: 568-77. Wong A, Jensen JD, Pool JE, Aquadro CF. 2007. Phylogenetic incongruence in the melanogaster species group. Mol Phy Evol 43(3): 1138-50. Epub. 2006 Sep 9. Wong A, Albright SN, Wolfner MF. 2006. Evidence for structural constraint on ovulin, a rapidly evolving Drosophila melanogaster seminal protein. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 103:18644-9. Wong A, Wolfner MF. 2006. Sexual behavior: a seminal peptide stimulates appetites. Current Biology 16(7):R256-7. Pool JE, Wong A, Aquadro CF. 2006. Finding of male-killing Spiroplasma infecting Drosophila melanogaster in Africa implies transatlantic migration of this endosymbiont. Heredity 97(1): 27-32. Swanson WJ, Wong A, Wolfner MF, Aquadro CF. 2004. Evolutionary EST analysis of Drosophila female reproductive tracts identifies several genes subjected to positive selection. Genetics 168(3): 1457-65. Links Ottawa Microbiology Symposium Friends and collaborators Charles Aquadro Andrew Clark Duncan Greig Jeff Jensen Rees Kassen Thien-Fah Mah Howard Rundle Mariana Wolfner |