The Department of Biology is excited to invite you to a seminar entitled "Biophysical principles underlying plant strategies" by Dr. Adam B. Roddy, Assistant Professor in the Department of Environmental Studies at New York University on Monday, February 2nd at 3pm in BL234. We kindly ask you to make every effort to attend.

Host: Dr. Rachel Spigler

More information about the speaker here: https://www.adamroddy.com

Abstract: On the one hand, natural selection has generated an incredible amount of phenotypic diversity, but on the other hand, organisms are bound by some basic and immutable physical principles that can limit diversity. How do we reconcile these two perspectives? In this talk, I will argue that better articulation of these principles and elucidation of their impacts across scales of organization can improve our understanding of how natural selection acts. Rather than seeing these physical limits as constraining, I will argue that they merely change the available set of strategic options available to plants.  This talk will draw on examples of genome size-cell size allometry and flower physiology to consider the future of plant function and evolution.