Carole S. Hickman

Carole S. Hickman is a Professor at the University of California, Berkeley. Her research integrates theoretical, constructional, evolutionary, and developmental morphology to understand the diversity of structure and function in living and fossil organisms, with a focus on molluscs. She explores macroevolutionary trends through phylogenetic trajectories in design spaces and investigates taphonomic assembly in shell beds linked to global climate change during the Cenozoic Era.

• Primary Research Organisms: Molluscs
• Key Tools: Design spaces, ecospaces, ethospaces, developmental spaces
• Current Projects: Community architecture responses to climate change, microbial-metazoan interactions in extreme environments

Her publications highlight interdisciplinary approaches to evolutionary morphology, with recent work emphasizing gastropod larval development and biomineralization changes at metamorphosis. Students in her laboratory prioritize independent research questions while utilizing molecular tools and shared evolutionary methodologies.