Postdoc
Office/Lab: LSS 304
email: pgnelson@email.arizona.edu
I am an evolutionary biologist interested in a variety of topics including the factors which constrain evolution, the sex lives of insects, fungi, and parasites in general. For my PhD I developed models of the evolution of host-symbiont interactions in a community context at the University of Minnesota. I also worked on the evolution of symbiont defense of the host and examined the evolution of virulence empirically using the smut fungus Ustilago maydis. I am currently modeling the evolution of errors in gene expression in and evolvability and the role of somatic mutations in aging and cancer.
Publications:
- Nelson P, Masel J. (2018) Evolutionary capacitance emerges spontaneously during adaptation to environmental changes, Cell reports, 25(1):249-258
- Nelson P, Masel J. (2017) Intercellular competition and the inevitability of multicellular aging, PNAS 114: 12982–12987.