Erin Morrison

Erin Morrison

Clinical Assistant Professor

Biography

Erin Morrison is a Clinical Assistant Professor in Liberal Studies. She holds a B.A. in Biology from Amherst College and received her Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from the University of Arizona.

Morrison is an evolutionary biologist who studies how the developmental architecture of a trait influences its patterns of diversification. She particularly focuses on how the structure of metabolic pathways drive phenotypic changes. Morrison’s current research includes investigating the diversification of avian carotenoid metabolic pathways that underlie plumage coloration as well as the role of horizontal gene transfer in the evolution of metabolic pathways in photosynthetic eukaryotes, such as plants and red algae. Her work has been published in the journals Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B: Biological Sciences, Nature Communications, Evolution, American Naturalist, Journal of Evolutionary Biology, BMC Evolutionary Biology, Biology Direct, Integrative and Comparative Biology, and Journal of Avian Biology.

Prior to joining NYU, Morrison was a postdoctoral fellow in the Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics at the American Museum of Natural History.

Education

Ph.D. – University of Arizona
B.A. – Amherst College

Teaching and Research Interests

Evolutionary biology, systems biology, ornithology, metabolomics, adaptation and phenotypic diversification

Selected Publications

Badyaev, A.V., Posner, A.B., Morrison, E.S., Higginson, D.M. (2019) Cycles of external dependency drive evolution of avian carotenoid networks. Nature Communications 10: 1596.

Badyaev, A.V. and Morrison, E.S. (2018) Emergent buffering reconciles evolvability and robustness in the evolution of phenotypic flexibility. Evolution 72: 647-662.

Morrison, E.S. and Badyaev, A.V. (2018) Structure versus time in the evolutionary diversification of avian carotenoid metabolic networks. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 31: 764-772.

Morrison, E.S. and Badyaev, A.V. (2017) Beyond network topology: Coevolution of structure and flux in metabolic networks. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 30: 1796-1809.

Badyaev, A.V., Potticary, A.L., and Morrison, E.S. (2017) Most colorful example of genetic assimilation? Exploring the evolutionary destiny of recurrent phenotypic accommodation. American Naturalist 190: 266-280.

Morrison, E.S. and Badyaev, A.V. (2016) Structuring evolution: Biochemical networks and color diversification in birds. BMC Evolutionary Biology 16: 168.

Morrison, E.S. and Badyaev, A.V. (2016) The landscape of evolution: Reconciling structural and dynamic properties of metabolic networks in adaptive diversifications. Integrative and Comparative Biology 56: 247-259.

Higginson, D.M., Belloni, V., Davis, S.N., Morrison, E.S., Andrews, J.E., and Badyaev, A.V. (2016) Evolution of long-term coloration trends with biochemically unstable ingredients. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B: Biological Sciences 283: 20160403.

Badyaev, A.V., Morrison, E.S., Belloni, V., and Sanderson, M.J. (2015) Tradeoff between robustness and elaboration in carotenoid networks produces cycles of avian color diversification. Biology Direct 10: 45.