I am interested in understanding how and why pollinators make choices about which flowers to visit, and how this affects the success and fitness of both sides of the plant-pollinator mutualism. In particular my research focusses on how the physical and chemical properties of nectar and pollen interact with bee foraging dynamics and energetics to shape their pollination behaviour. Although I mainly work with bees, I enjoy branching into research with other species when the opportunity arises.
Bee research often captures public attention and my work has been featured in national and international media. See below for links to a couple of interviews with me on my work and an imaginative reinterpretation of one of my papers as a children's story for NPR in the USA.
Prior to my time at Oxford I studied at St Andrews for a BSc (Hons) in Zoology and a research Masters degree in Chemical Ecology, followed by a PhD at the University of Cambridge on the biomechanics of plant-pollinator interactions. I worked for several years at Oxford as a post-doctoral researcher within the Bee Lab and I am currently an Eric and Wendy Schmidt AI in Science Fellow in the Department of Biology and Associate Research Fellow at Reuben College.
