Degrees Offered: Animal Behavior
Overview
The study of animal behavior is one of the most integrative enterprises in biology. As Niko Tinbergen pointed out long ago, to explain any behavior fully requires information about its development, its underlying physiological mechanisms, its adaptive value, and its evolutionary origin and modifications. Therefore, genetics, developmental biology, physiology, ecology, and evolutionary biology must all be employed to construct a complete explanation for any behavioral trait.
In this new interdisciplinary Ph.D. program in Animal Behavior at ASU (to begin Fall 2009), students will acquire the conceptual and empirical tools for asking novel questions in the field and at different levels of biological organization. In addition to SOLS faculty and students, this campus-wide training initiative involves members of the Center for Social Dynamics and Complexity at ASU, the Department of Psychology, the School of Human Evolution and Social Change, and the Department of Integrated Natural Sciences at ASU West Campus. Such broad, inter-unit participation makes ASU one of the strongest centers for animal behavior research in the nation.
Applications for entry into this program will be accepted through the end of 2009, with the first cohort of students beginning in Fall 2010. For more details about this program, contact the co-chairs of the planning committee for this program:
Dr. Kevin McGraw, School of Life Sciences, Phone: (480) 965-5518
Dr. Ron Rutowski, School of Life Sciences, Phone: (480) 965-4369
Participating SOLS Faculty
- Gro Amdam
- Sharon Crook
- Dale DeNardo
- Pierre Deviche
- Carsten Duch
- Jennifer Fewell
- Juergen Gadau
- Leah Gerber
- Jon Harrison
- Bert Hoelldobler
- Manfred Laubichler
- Juergen Liebig
- Kevin McGraw
- Michael Moore
- Miles Orchinik
- Robert Page
- David Pearson
- Ronald Rutowski
- Andrew Smith
- Brian Smith