Sexual selection & male care

I find the interplay between parental care and sexual selection particularly interesting. In 2006, I published a paper called "Evolution and maintenance of male care: Is increased paternity a neglected benefit of care?" with an idea and a simple model. To my delight, the idea has since been tested both empirically and by more elaborate models than I could ever master myself. Please read:

Hopwood, P. E., Moore, A. J., Tregenza, T. & Royle, N. J. (2015). Male burying beetles extend, not reduce, parental care duration when reproductive competition is high. Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 28, 1394-1402. doi: 10.1111/jeb.12664

Kahn, A. T., Schwanz, L. E. & Kokko, H. (2013). Paternity protection can provide a kick-start for the evolution of male-only parental care. Evolution. doi: 10.1111/evo.12103

The interplay between parental care and sexual selection was the focus of a workshop, organized by Gustavo (Billy) Requena and myself in 2018. Male care as a resource also matters for how we define and think about sexual selection,  as I have explored in a paper written together with David Shuker.

Together with Adam Jones, University of Idaho, and Glenn Moore, Western Australian Museum, I have done several field based studies on sexual selection and the genetic mating system of the Western Australian seahorse, Hippocampus subelongatus. Lucy Woodall, Oxford University, and Erica Leder, University of Gothenburg, are involved in other aspects of these studies.

Other projects include post-mating sexual selection and evolution of egg size in pipefish focusing mainly on Syngnathus typhle. These studies are done together with Ingrid Ahnesjö, UU, Adam Jones, Kenyon Mobley, Charlyn Partridge, Texas A&M University/Univ of Idaho, and my former PhD students Gry Sagebakken and Inês Braga Gonçalves, GU. Master students Malin Nygård and Josefin Sundin, and Bachelor student Emma Martinsson, GU, have also been involved in this work.

I also study questions about male care, sneaking and filial cannibalism in several species of gobies, including the sand goby Pomatoschistus minutus, common goby P. microps, and round goby Neogobius melanostomus, together with several current and former students and post docs. These include former post doc Topi Lehtonen, ÅAU, and FoAss Ola Svensson, GU; PhD students Leon Green, GU; Eva-Lotta Blom, GU; Ola Svensson, SU, and Maria Norevik Andrén (Lissåker), SU; Master students Therese Larsson (Stenlund), Karin Olsson, Johannes Björk, Sofie Schöld, Petter Gustafsson, GU, and Jessica Åsbacka, ÅAU; Erasmus students Carlos Rubio Gimenez, GU/Univ of València, Aurora García-Berro, GU/Univ of Barcelona, and Martina Gríful, GU/Univ of Barcelona, Spain.

I am also collaborating with Colette St Mary, University of Florida, Elisabet Forsgren, NINA, Trondheim, Kai Lindström, ÅAU, Gunilla Rosenqvist, UU, and other researchers on projects on sand gobies, two-spotted gobies and round gobies. For more info on the round goby projects and collaborators, please see the link to "Sperm adaptation and plasticity".

GU: University of Gothenburg; SU: Stockholm University; UU: Uppsala University, Sweden; ÅAU: Åbo Akademi University, Finland