I just got back from the Evolution 2014 meetings in Raleigh, North Carolina! It was a blast, full of great conversations and fascinating research. I was especially impressed by talks by Peter Andolfatto, Katie Lotterhos, Mark Rausher, John Weins, Molly Schumer, and Young Wha Lee. I also quite enjoyed the American Society of Naturalists' VP Symposium on Modern Approaches to Local Adaptation, organized by UBC's own Mike Whitlock.

I also talked about my research on the new California sunflower, Helianthus winteri. It was even recorded by a volunteer! The volunteer missed the first few minutes of my talk, so if you decide to watch it, a quick recap of my introduction is below the fold.

We have been working on a two enzyme protocol for preparing genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS) libraries for sunflowers, starting by modifying the approach taken by Poland et al. 2012. I recently got our first set of sequence data back for two of these libraries, and compared the data to previous GBS libraries using PstI alone. My initial analysis is here. Contact me if you are interested in our protocol!