9424150 Robinson The International Junior Investigator and Postdoctoral Fellows Program enables U.S. scientists and engineers to conduct three to twenty-four months of research abroad. The program's awards provide opportunities for joint research, and the use of unique or complementary facilities, expertise and experimental conditions abroad. This award will support a twelve-month postdoctoral research visit by Dr. Beren W. Robinson of Binghamton University to work with Professor Dolph Schluter at the University of British Columbia on the evolution of ecological specialization in freshwater sticklebacks that are morphologically polymorphic. Phenotypic differentiation in lake fishes frequently falls along an ecological gradient that is defined at one end by the shallow littoral habitat along the lake margin ("Benthic"), and at the other end by the deep open waters found at the center of lakes ("limnetic"). These habitats are believed to exert strong and alternative selective pressures on the species that specialize in each habitat because of functional constraints on fish morphology and behavior. A reciprocal transplant growth experiment in the field will be performed and a correlation analysis between phenotype and various components of fitness using limnetic and benthic morphs of freshwater sticklebacks. This research will demonstrate trade-offs among morphs drawn from a single population of fish and will shed new light on how specialist phenotypes evolve within fishes and other taxa. ***
