Seth Bordenstein: Animal Speciation and the Gut Microbiome
Channel: Dr. Seth Bordenstein
Date: 2013-06-24

One small step for the microbiome, one giant step for evolution. 

In this June 23, 2013 talk at the annual Evolution Meeting in Snowbird, Utah, Professor Bordenstein discusses new scientific evidence by postdoc Robert M. Brucker on the evolution of the animal gut microbiome ("phylosymbiosis") and the interwoven role of animal genes and microbes in speciation. 

Topics include the history of evolutionary biology and symbiosis, the predictive framework for studying speciation by symbiosis, the evidence for phylosymbiosis, and the microbial basis of reproductive isolation.

Cover image credit to Robert M. Brucker. Video editing done in IMovie. For further information, comments below are welcome or see the Bordenstein lab at http://bordensteinlab.vanderbilt.edu, Prof. Bordenstein's twitter feed @Symbionticism and blog at http://symbionticism.blogspot.com. The research discussed in this seminar was principally conducted by Robert M. Brucker; whose blog is at http://liveinsymbiosis.blogspot.com and twitter feed @LiveInSymbiosis.