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Michelle ClementsLocation: Ashworth Laboratory |
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| 2007 | PhD "Phenology in a wild red deer population", University of Edinburgh | |
| 2005-2006 | Credit Risk Analyst, Barclays Bank, London | |
| 2004 - 2005 | Business Analyst, National Australia Bank, Leeds | |
| 2000-2004 | MSci. Mathematics, University College London | |
Research Interests
The timing of different events in an animal's year can have a critical effect on its fitness: for example, breed too early and there may not be enough food available, breed too late and offspring may not have time to grow sufficiently before winter arrives.
The continuous individual-based study of wild red deer (Cervus elaphus) on the Isle of Rum, NW Scotland, has enabled the development of an unusual mammalian database which can be used to investigate phenology.
The aim of my PhD is to address the following questions:
- What are the environmental determinants of different aspects of phenology in red deer?
- Is there evidence for population-level trends in response to large-scale environmental change?
- How much of the variance in phenology is due to heritable genetic effects, and what are the genetic correlations between different phonological traits, and with other important traits such as body size?
- What are the selective pressures shaping timing traits?
I am considering several different aspects of phenology, specifically breeding time for both sexes, female gestation length, and timing of the growth of antlers.