Robert Dale Reed

Picture of Robert Dale Reed
Assistant Professor, Ecology & Evolutionary Biology
School of Biological Sciences
Ph.D., University of Arizona, 2004, Molecular and Cellular Biology
B.A., U.C. Berkeley, 1997, Integrative Biology
Phone: (919) 451-5420
Email: rreed@uci.edu
University of California, Irvine
321 Steinhaus Hall
Mail Code: 2525
Irvine, CA 92697
Research Interests
Evolution and development; butterfly wing patterns.
Websites
Academic Distinctions
Research Associate - Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute - 2011-present
Postdoctoral Fellow in Comparative Genomics - Duke University - 2005-07
Hargitt Research Fellow in Cell Biology - Duke University - 2004
John Adams Comstock Award - The Lepidopterists' Society - 1997
Research Abstract
Neotropical Heliconius butterflies are famous for their wing pattern variation and mimicry. There is an active community of researchers working on many aspects of Heliconius biology, including population dynamics, behavior, phylogeny, genetics, and development. The experimental accessibility of this genus at many levels provides an exciting opportunity to produce a highly integrated portrait of the interplay between speciation and morphological evolution.

I am working to characterize the genes and genomic regulatory elements that underlie wing pattern variation within and between populations. This work is being done in the context of a larger international collaboration to identify color pattern genes across multiple species of Heliconius.
Publications
The Heliconius Genome Consortium. Genomic evidence for promiscuous exchange of adaptations among Heliconius butterfly species. Nature. In press.
Finkbeiner, S.D., A.D. Briscoe, R.D. Reed. The benefit of being a social butterfly: communal roosting deters predation. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. In press.
Daniels, E.V., K.A. Mooney, and R.D. Reed. (2012) Seasonal wing color plasticity varies dramatically between buckeye butterfly populations in different climatic zones. Ecological Entomology. In press.
Bybee, S.M., F. Yuan, M.D. Ramstetter,J.L. Bousquets, R.D. Reed, D. Osorio, and A.D. Briscoe. (2012) UV photoreceptors and UV-yellow wing pigments in Heliconius butterflies allow a color signal to serve both mimicry and intraspecific communication. American Naturalist. In press.
Hines, H.M., B.A. Counterman, R. Papa, P. A. de Moura, M.A. Cardoso, M. Linares, J. Mallet, R.D. Reed, C.D. Jiggins, M. Kronforst, W.O. McMillan. (2011) A wing patterning gene redefines the mimetic history of Heliconius butterflies. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. 108: 19666-19671.
Reed, R.D., R. Papa, A. Martin, H.M. Hines, B.A. Counterman, C. Pardo-Diaz, C.D. Jiggins, N.L. Chamberlain, M.R. Kronforst, R. Chen, G. Halder, H.F. Nijhout, and W.O. McMillan. optix drives the repeated convergent evolution of butterfly wing pattern mimicry. (2011) Science. 333: 1137-1141.
Macdonald W.P., A. Martin, and R.D. Reed. (2010) Butterfly wings shaped by a molecular cookie cutter: Evolutionary radiation of lepidopteran wing shapes associated with a derived Cut / wingless wing margin boundary system. Evolution & Development. 12: 296-304.
Martin, A., and R.D. Reed. (2010) wingless and aristaless2 define a developmental ground plan for moth and butterfly wing pattern evolution. Molecular Biology and Evolution. 27: 2864-2878.
Briscoe, A.D., S.M. Bybee, G.D. Bernard, F. Yuan, M.P. Sison-Mangus, R.D. Reed, A.D. Warren, J. Llorente-Bousquets, and C.-C. Chiao. (2010) Positive selection of a duplicated UV-sensitive visual pigment coincides with wing pigment evolution in Heliconius butterflies. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. 107: 3628-3633.
Counterman, B. A., F. Arajuo-Perez, H.M. Hines, S.W. Baxter, C.M. Morrison, D.P. Lindstrom, R. Papa, L. Ferguson, M. Joron, R. ffrench-Constant, C. Smith, D.M. Nielsen, R. Chen, C.D. Jiggins, R.D. Reed, G. Halder, J. Mallet, and W. O. McMillan. (2010) Genomic hotspots for adaptation: The population genetics of Müllerian mimicry in Heliconius erato. PLoS Genetics 6(2): e1000796.
Papa, R., A. Martin, and R.D. Reed. (2008) Genomic hotspots of adaptation in butterfly wing pattern evolution. Current Opinion in Genetics and Development 18: 559-564.
Papa R., C.M. Morrison, J.R. Walters, B.A. Counterman, R. Chen, G. Halder, L. Ferguson, N. Chamberlain, R. ffrench-Constant, D.D. Kapan, C.D. Jiggins, R.D. Reed, and W.O McMillan. (2008) Highly conserved gene order and numerous novel repetitive elements in genomic regions linked to wing pattern variation in Heliconius butterflies. BMC Genomics 9: 345.
Reed, R.D., W.O. McMillan, and L.M. Nagy (2008) Gene expression underlying adaptive variation in Heliconius wing patterns: non-modular regulation of overlapping cinnabar and vermilion prepatterns. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 275: 37-45.
Reed, R.D., P.-H. Chen, and H.F. Nijhout (2007) Cryptic variation in butterfly eyespot development: the importance of sample size in gene expression studies. Evolution & Development 9: 2-9.
Kapan, D.D., N.S. Flanagan, A. Tobler, R. Papa, R.D. Reed, J.A. Gonzalez, M.R. Restrepo, L. Martinez, K. Maldonado, C. Ritschoff, D.G. Heckel, and W.O. McMillan (2006) Localization of Müllerian mimicry genes on a dense linkage map of Heliconius erato. Genetics 173: 735-757.
Reed, R.D., and L.M. Nagy (2005) Evolutionary redeployment of a biosynthetic module: expression of eye pigment genes vermilion, cinnabar, and white in butterfly wing development. Evolution & Development 7: 301-311.
Reed, R.D. (2005) Gregarious oviposition in butterflies. Journal of the Lepidopterists’ Society 59: 40-43.
Reed, R.D., and L.E. Gilbert. (2004) Wing venation and Distal-less expression in Heliconius butterfly wing pattern development. Development Genes and Evolution 214: 628-634.
Reed, R.D., and M.S. Serfas (2004) Butterfly wing pattern evolution is associated with changes in a Notch/Distal-less temporal pattern formation process. Current Biology 14: 1159-1166.
Reed, R.D. (2004) Evidence for Notch-mediated lateral inhibition in organizing butterfly wing scales. Development Genes and Evolution 214: 43-46.
Reed, R.D. (2003) Gregarious oviposition and clutch size adjustment by a Heliconius butterfly. Biotropica 35: 555-559.
Caterino, M., R.D. Reed, M.M. Kuo, and F.A.H. Sperling (2001) A partitioned likelihood analysis of swallowtail butterfly phylogeny (Lepidoptera: Papilionidae). Systematic Biology 50: 106-127.
Reed, R.D., and F.A.H. Sperling (1999) The interaction of process partitions in phylogenetic analysis: an example from the swallowtail butterfly genus Papilio. Molecular Biology and Evolution 16: 286-297.
Grants
Molecular Basis of Mimicry in Heliconius Butterflies. NSF DEB-0715140
Identity of Function of Heliconius Mimicry Genes. NSF IOS-1052541
Research Centers
Center for Complex Biological Systems
Last updated
04/06/2007