Associate Professor of Biology
BS University of Guelph (1989)
MS McGill University (1992)
Ph.D. McGill University (1996)
206 Winston Hall
(336) 758-4292
areas of interest
evolutionary genetics, particularly adaptation, mutation, and the evolution of sex
research
Evolutionary change usually happens too slowly to be observed directly, which makes it difficult to study the genetic basis of evolution. My lab studies evolution as it occurs in budding yeast,
Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Its short generation time allows a significant amount of evolutionary change to be observed within several months, and the tools of classical genetics and current genomics methods can then be used to examine the genetic details of how populations adapt over thousands of generations.
Using this lab system we can study questions that are impossible to investigate in nature: if identical populations are placed in identical environments, do they adapt equally fast? By the same genetic mechanisms? We also run experiments to test specific hypotheses, with particular interests in the evolution of sex and of diversity and in the quantitative genetics of adaptation.
selected publications
Zeyl, C. 2007. Evolutionary genetics: a piggyback ride to adaptation and diversity. Current Biology 17: R333-335.
Zeyl, C. 2007. How missing genes interact. Nature Genetics (News & Views) 39:440-442.
Zeyl, C. 2006. Evolutionary genetics: choosing to evolve. Current Biology 16: R87-R89.
Zeyl , C., C. Curtin, K. Karnap, and E. Beauchamp. 2005. Tradeoffs between sexual and vegetative fitness in
Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Evolution 59: 2109-2115.
Zeyl, C., B. Andreson, and E. Weninck. 2005. Nuclear-mitochondrial epistasis for fitness in
Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Evolution 59: 910-914.
Zeyl, C. 2005. The number of mutations selected during adaptation in a laboratory population of
Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Genetics 169: 1825-1831
Grimberg, B. and C. Zeyl. 2005. The effects of sex and mutation rate on adaptation in test tubes and to mouse hosts by
Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Evolution 59: 431-438.
Zeyl, C., T. Vanderford, and M. Carter. 2003. An evolutionary advantage of haploidy in large yeast populations. Science 299: 555–558.
Taylor, D. R., C. Zeyl, and E. Cooke. 2002. Conflicting levels of selection in the accumulation of mitochondrial defects in
Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 99: 3690-3694.
Zeyl, C., M. Mizesko, and J. A. G. M.
DeVisser. 2001. Mutational meltdown in laboratory yeast populations. Evolution 55: 909-917.
Zeyl, C. and J. A. G. M.
DeVisser. 2001. Estimates of the rate and distribution of fitness effects of spontaneous mutation in
Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Genetics157: 53-61.
Zeyl, C. W. 2000. Budding yeast as a model organism for population genetics. Yeast 16: 773-784.
de Visser, J. A. G. M., C. Zeyl, P. J. Gerrish, J. L. Blanchard and R. E. Lenski 1999. Diminishing returns from mutation supply rate in asexual populations. Science 283: 404-406.
Zeyl, C. and G. Bell 1997. The advantage of sex in evolving yeast populations. Nature 388: 465-468
Zeyl, C., G. Bell, and D. M. Green 1996. Sex and the spread of retrotransposon Ty3 in experimental populations of
Saccharomyces cerevisae. Genetics 143: 1567-1577
Zeyl, C. and G. Bell 1996. Symbiotic DNA in the eukaryotic genome. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 11: 10-15
