Oskar Golwala Rose Hills
Investigating Divergent Selection Forces on Fish Feeding Mechanisms
Adaptive radiation is the process by which one ancestral species rapidly evolves into multiple new species adapted to different ecological roles. A striking example is the Cyprinodon pupfish of San Salvador Island, Bahamas. In only 10,000 to 15,000 years, these fish diversified into three feeding specialists: a generalist, a molluscivore, and a scale-eater. This makes them one of the fastest known examples of craniofacial diversification among vertebrates.
My project asks whether these species evolved different mechanical solutions for feeding success. To study this, I use the idea of a performance landscape, where combinations of traits such as jaw shape, strike speed, and timing are linked to feeding performance. Peaks represent highly successful strategies, while valleys represent poor ones. If each species occupies a different peak, it would suggest natural selection pushed them toward distinct feeding optima.
By comparing these landscapes across species, I hope to understand how biomechanics can drive the formation of new species and reveal whether evolution repeatedly favors certain solutions or follows many possible paths.
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