معرفی
Carl Gotthard is Professor of Animal Ecology at the Department of Zoology, Stockholm University, and also active at the Bolin Center for Climate Research. His work focuses on the evolutionary ecology of developmental plasticity and life history in insects, primarily butterflies.
Gotthard's research centers on how the diapause decision affects life cycle regulation and evolves due to variation in local selection pressures. He investigates how insect diapause and thermal adaptation affect spring phenology and interactions between butterflies and their host plants. His group explores the genetic background to adaptive variation in seasonal plasticity using a wide range of methods from field experiments to genomics.
His recent publications reveal consistent themes across multiple disciplines including evolutionary ecology, climate change biology, and molecular entomology. His work demonstrates how seasonal specialization drives population dynamics, how urbanization affects phenology, and how local adaptation occurs along climate gradients. The research shows intricate connections between photoperiodic responses, diapause mechanisms, and climate adaptation in butterflies.
Gotthard currently supervises three PhD students (Mats Ittonen, Anna Shoshan, and Isabelle Siemers) and has previously mentored numerous successful researchers who now lead their own groups at institutions worldwide. His research is funded by the Bolin Centre for Climate Research at Stockholm University and the Swedish Research Council (VR).
He leads the Gotthard Group, which conducts research on the evolutionary ecology of developmental plasticity in insects. The group uses multiple approaches including field experiments, laboratory studies, and genomic analyses to understand how insects adapt to seasonal environments and respond to climate change.
