I am a biologist interested in the diversity and evolution of land vertebrates. The dazzling array of mammals, birds, and their allies that we see around us today, differ by adaptations which are unique to each those organisms. I aim to figure out the molecular and developmental details of some of these adaptations in different animals. I use a combination of computational and experimental approaches to investigate these questions. During my PhD I studied how evolution of the transcriptome influenced bird sex chromosome evolution and speciation. In my postdoctoral research I studied the influence of enhancer sequence mutations on the gene regulation in primate and human brain development. I studied in Heidelberg (BSc) and Uppsala (MSc, PhD), before doing postdoctoral research at Yale University. I am currently an Assistant Professor at Utrecht University. Feel free to contact me with questions, also about demonstrations of experiments/equipment.

In a video conferencing call...

...I am happy to talk about my research.

...I am happy to answer questions about university and career-related questions.

...I am happy to moderate a discussion.

...I am happy to speak to others (e.g. to journalists, museums).