SEXUAL SELECTION IN A CHANGING WORLD


May 17-21, 2024
Erice, Sicily, ITALY


Workshop Organizers

Conference goals

Chiara Morosinotto (University of Padova and National Biodiversity Future Center, Italy)
Andrea Pilastro (University of Padova and National Biodiversity Future Center, Italy)
Gil Rosenthal (University of Padova and National Biodiversity Future Center, Italy)
Tamás Székely (University of Bath, UK)

Purpose of the Workshop

Conference goals

The onset of the Anthropocene presents natural populations with novel challenges at a hyper-accelerated rate. How do sexual selection, sexual competition, and mate choice help or hinder adaptation to environmental change? How can we make generalizations and predictions about these effects from information we can easily measure? How can we apply this knowledge to best practices in conservation? These urgent questions center around the fitness dynamics of sexual selection, a topic of contention for decades. For this workshop, we bring together internationally renowned theoreticians and empiricists from fields ranging from evolutionary genomics to behavioral ecology, population biology and cognitive ecology. Through talks, round tables, and structured discussions, we bring experts and students together to find areas of consensus, debate, and collaboration.

Speakers & Topics

Aneil Agrawal

How does evolution respond to environments differing in the opportunity for male harm?

Suzanne Alonzo

How do sexual selection and behavioral plasticity interact to affect how organisms respond to changing environments

Francesca Cagnacci

Behavioural responses to human direct disturbance: influence on sexual selection

Ulrika Candolin

Behavioural responses to human-induced environmental changes: influence on sexual selection

Tim Janicke

How do ecological and demographic factors alter the strength and form of sexual selection?

Jan Komdeur

Does social flexibility facilitate animals to cope with rapidly changing environmental conditions?

Constantino Macías Garcia

What are the ways in which human-induced environmental change modifies the consequences of sexual selection

Andrea Pilastro

Environmental variation and sexual selection

Noa Pinter-Wollman

How is mate choice impacted by interactions in other social situations and how are all these social interactions impacted by environmental changes (e.g., due to human induced disturbances)?

Gil Rosenthal

When is mate choice good for populations?

Rhonda Snook

How does environmental change impact the sexual selection landscape?

Tamás Székely

What are the causes and consequences of sex ratio bias, and its implications for population resilience?

Claus Wedekind

Effects of sexual selection on population fitness

Franjo Weissing

Does sexual selection facilitate or hamper adaptation to changing conditions?