The biological diversity we see today is the result of new species evolving and older ones going extinct. Therefore, to effectively conserve biodiversity, we need to understand the processes that cause extinction, as well as those that give rise to new species.

My research program explores the origin of biological species, using tropical birds as the primary study organism. We use a combination of observational, experimental and molecular approaches to study populations that are on the verge of becoming new species, providing us with unique and natural experiments to understand how new species evolve.