I'm a biologist with a main interest in functional and evolutionary genetics, sociogenomics and genome evolution. My focus thus far are social insects (e.g. ants, bees, wasps). These insects offer excellent systems to investigate phenotypic plasticity, genetics of novel traits, sex chromosome and genome evolution;under the interplay of recombination, selection and drift. I also have a strong interest in phylogeny and phylogeography, ecology and conservation as well as taxonomy of bees and wasps.