Yun Ding of the School of Arts & Sciences led research on courtship rituals of a close cousin of the common fruit fly and discovered a novel female adaptation that promotes prolonged courtship in males. “New traits are often ancient behaviors re-surfacing under the right conditions,” she says. “At first, we were cautious in our claim of novelty, but our methods and analysis continually pointed to this female wing-spreading behavior being a newly evolved novelty.”
From left: Dawn Chen, Yun Ding, and Minaho Li.
