Collaboration between the Pontificia Universidad (Chile) and Roscoff

As part of a postdoctoral project in collaboration between the Catholic University of Santiago of Chile and the biological station, Ronan Becheler studies the evolutionary ecology of the giant kelp (Macrocystis pyrifera), paying a particuliar attention on the strategy of reproduction.

He aims at exploring its geographical variations, notably at the range edges: does a marginal population rely on higher rate of  autofecondation (or eventually on enhanced clonality), as a reproductive insurance ?

The project is still running; for now, what we can say can be put in this nutshell : as usually in evolution, thinks about sex are not so simple.