Scott Taylor

Associate Professor • Director, Mountain Research Station •
• Evolutionary ecology • Population genomics

Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

scott.a.taylor@colorado.edu

Bio

Hybridization, speciation, evolutionary ecology, and population genomics (primarily of birds); impacts of anthropogenic change on species distributions, interactions, and evolution.

Check out the Taylor Lab website for more about the work of my research group, including the Boulder Chickadee Study, and my teaching and publications. Graduate and undergraduate students can also find information about joining the lab.

Education

PhD: Queen's University, 2011

Research

My research applies genomics and field experiments to natural hybrid zones and closely related taxa in order to investigate the architecture of reproductive isolation—the hallmark of speciation—and the genetic bases of traits relevant to speciation. This research also provides insight into the impacts of anthropogenic change, including climate change, on species distributions, interactions, and evolution.

Publications

Recent publications

Anthropogenic Change and the Process of Speciation.

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors:

Ålund M; Cenzer M; Bierne N; Boughman JW; Cerca J; Comerford MS; Culicchi A; Langerhans B; McFarlane SE; Möst MH...

Ålund M
Cenzer M
Bierne N
Boughman JW
Cerca J
Comerford MS
Culicchi A
Langerhans B
McFarlane SE
Möst MH

Published in: Cold Spring Harbor perspectives in biology
Publication Date: 2023-10-03
Type: Journal Article

Quantitative Analyses of Coupling in Hybrid Zones.

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Firneno TJ; Semenov G; Dopman EB; Taylor SA; Larson EL; Gompert Z

Published in: Cold Spring Harbor perspectives in biology
Publication Date: 2023-09-22
Type: Journal Article

Slow birding: The art and science of enjoying the birds in your own backyard

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Padula SR; Addison N; Patel AM; Buell A; Kenyon HL; Taylor SA

Published in: Condor: an international journal of avian biology
Publication Date: 2023-08-11
Type: Journal Article

Similar parasite communities but dissimilar infection patterns in two closely related chickadee species

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Theodosopoulos AN; Grabenstein KC; Larrieu ME; Arnold V; Taylor SA

Published in: Auk: a quarterly journal of ornithology
Publication Date: 2023-07-14
Type: Journal Article

The genetic basis of plumage coloration and elevation adaptation in a clade of recently diverged alpine and arctic songbirds

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Funk ER; Spellman GM; Winker K; Withrow JJ; Ruegg KC; Taylor SA

Published in: Evolution
Publication Date: 2023-03-01
Type: Journal Article

Hybridization between closely related songbirds is related to human habitat disturbance

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Grabenstein KC; Otter KA; Burg TM; Taylor SA

Published in: Global Change Biology
Publication Date: 2022-10-28
Type: Journal Article

Sympatry leads to reduced body condition in chickadees that occasionally hybridize

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Grabenstein KC; Otter KA; Burg TM; Taylor SA

Published in: Ecology and Evolution
Publication Date: 2022-04-01
Type: Journal Article

Estimating hybridization in the wild using citizen science data: A path forward

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Minor NR; Dougherty PJ; Taylor SA; Carling MD

Published in: Evolution
Publication Date: 2022-02-01
Type: Journal Article

The genetic basis of spatial cognitive variation in a food-caching bird

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Branch CL; Semenov GA; Wagner DN; Sonnenberg BR; Pitera AM; Bridge ES; Taylor SA; Pravosudov VV

Published in: Current Biology
Publication Date: 2022-01-10
Type: Journal Article

A supergene underlies linked variation in color and morphology in a Holarctic songbird

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Funk ER; Mason NA; Palsson S; Albrecht T; Johnson JA; Taylor SA

Published in: Nature Communications
Publication Date: 2021-11-25
Type: Journal Article

A highly invasive malaria parasite has expanded its range to non-migratory birds in North America

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Theodosopoulos AN; Grabenstein KC; Bensch S; Taylor SA

Published in: Biology Letters
Publication Date: 2021-09-08
Type: Journal Article

Achromatic plumage variation between and within hybridizing Black-capped and Mountain chickadees

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Feldmann KB; Grabenstein KC; Taylor SA

Published in: Journal of Field Ornithology
Publication Date: 2021-06-01
Type: Journal Article

Phylogenomic Data Reveal Widespread Introgression Across the Range of an Alpine and Arctic Specialist

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Funk ER; Spellman GM; Winker K; Withrow JJ; Ruegg KC; Zavaleta E; Taylor SA

Published in: Systematic Biology
Publication Date: 2021-05-01
Type: Journal Article

Dense sampling of bird diversity increases power of comparative genomics (vol 587, pg 252, 2020)

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Feng S; Stiller J; Deng Y; Armstrong J; Fang Q; Reeve AH; Xie D; Chen G; Guo C; Faircloth BC

Published in: Nature
Publication Date: 2021-04-29
Type: Journal Article

Genomic and acoustic differences separate Lilian's Meadowlark (Sturnella magna lilianae) from Eastern (S. magna) and Western (S. neglecta) meadowlarks

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Beam JK; Funk ER; Taylor SA

Published in: Auk: a quarterly journal of ornithology
Publication Date: 2021-04-24
Type: Journal Article

Rapid speciation via the evolution of pre-mating isolation in the Ibera Seedeater

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott; Safran, Rebecca J

All Authors:

Turbek SP; Browne M; Di Giacomo AS; Kopuchian C; Hochachka WM; Estalles C; Lijtmaer DA; Tubaro PL; Silveira LF; Lovette ...

Turbek SP
Browne M
Di Giacomo AS
Kopuchian C
Hochachka WM
Estalles C
Lijtmaer DA
Tubaro PL
Silveira LF
Lovette IJ

Published in: Science
Publication Date: 2021-03-26
Type: Journal Article

An isolated white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) population on St. John, US Virgin Islands shows low inbreeding and comparable heterozygosity to other larger populations

CU Boulder Authors: Reuter, Jon D; Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Nelson SL; Taylor SA; Reuter JD

Published in: Ecology and Evolution
Publication Date: 2021-03-01
Type: Journal Article

Asymmetric introgression reveals the genetic architecture of a plumage trait

CU Boulder Authors: Semenov, Georgy; Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Semenov GA; Linck E; Enbody ED; Harris RB; Khaydarov DR; Alstrom P; Andersson L; Taylor SA

Published in: Nature Communications
Publication Date: 2021-02-15
Type: Journal Article

Dense sampling of bird diversity increases power of comparative genomics

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Feng S; Stiller J; Deng Y; Armstrong J; Fang Q; Reeve AH; Xie D; Chen G; Guo C; Faircloth BC

Published in: Nature
Publication Date: 2020-11-12
Type: Journal Article

Leveraging eDNA to expand the study of hybrid zones

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Stewart KA; Taylor SA

Published in: Molecular Ecology
Publication Date: 2020-08-01
Type: Journal Article

Genomic and plumage variation in Vermivora hybrids

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Baiz MD; Kramer GR; Streby HM; Taylor SA; Lovette IJ; Toews DPL

Published in: Auk: a quarterly journal of ornithology
Publication Date: 2020-07-01
Type: Journal Article

Genomic regions underlying metabolic and neuronal signaling pathways are temporally consistent in a moving avian hybrid zone

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Wagner DN; Curry RL; Chen N; Lovette IJ; Taylor SA

Published in: Evolution
Publication Date: 2020-06-15
Type: Journal Article

Effects of hybridization on cognition in chickadees: A common garden approach

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Rice AM; Huynh A; Spinelli JMC; Roth TC; Taylor SA

Published in: Integrative and Comparative Biology
Publication Date: 2020-01-03
Type: Conference Proceeding

Book review of evolutionary genetics: Concepts, analysis, and practice

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott; Semenov, Georgy

All Authors: Turbek SP; Semenov GA; Taylor SA

Published in: Molecular Ecology
Publication Date: 2019-10-01
Type: Journal Article

High-throughput sequencing is revealing genetic associations with avian plumage color

CU Boulder Authors: Taylor, Scott

All Authors: Funk ER; Taylor SA

Published in: Auk: a quarterly journal of ornithology
Publication Date: 2019-10-01
Type: Journal Article

Teaching

Scott teaches a number of field-based and lecture format undergraduate courses. He incorporates creativity into his pedagogy when possible, and encourages his students to engage with the subject matter in unconventional ways. Students who take the course Ecology and Evolution in the Galápagos Islands keep field notes alongside watercolor depictions of their observations.

Courses

See Scott's courses on his lab website.

Abigail Buell

Graduate Student •
• Bioinformatics

Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

Visit the Taylor Lab

abbu8464@colorado.edu

Sara Padula

PhD Student •
• Evolution • Cognition • Genomics • Ornithology

Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

Visit the Taylor Lab I am interested in the similarities and differences of the evolution of spatial cognition in Black-capped and Mountain Chickadees in the Rocky Mountains. I research this through conducting cognitive tests on chickadees in the field and then associating their cognitive performances with their genetics.

sara.padula@colorado.edu

---

Outreach

The Storycollider story: Becoming: Stories about growing into yourself. Storycollider podcast with transcript, May 2022.

TedX Boulder talk: Why you should pay attention to backyard birds. YouTube video, July 2019.

News

Out of its nest box for the first time, a young chickadee squints in the sun and stretches its wings.

Chickadees crossbreed, despite biological barriers

Aug. 29, 2023

Researchers in the Taylor Lab study interactions between higher-elevation dwelling mountain chickadees and the closely related lower-elevation dwelling black capped chickadees. A recent study in Global Change Biology investigates barriers that prevent the two species from mating and what happens when they do mate and produce offspring.

Nine researchers stand close together facing the camera, smiling and holding butterfly nets, clipboards, and water bottles. They stand in a grassy clearing surrounded by trees, under a blue sky.

A world-class field research station in CU Boulder’s backyard (CU RIO)

July 18, 2023

CU Boulder’s Mountain Research Station has a three-pronged mission—host some of the most influential and long-running ecological research in the world, give students a peerless education in mountain environments, and link the public to learning about important ecosystems.

A student and Prof. Bill Bowman crouch on the wildflower-strewn tundra of the Mountain Research Station.

‘Classroom in the sky’ inspires generations of researchers, students (CU Arts & Sciences)

June 12, 2023

Just north of Nederland, about 26 miles from Boulder, is CU Boulder’s “classroom in the sky”—the Mountain Research Station. It is home to some of the world’s longest-running alpine research, from how vegetation responds to wildfires, to how wildlife responds to climate change, to the changing composition of the soil itself.

Alpine wildflowers bloom on the tundra of Niwot Ridge. Photo by William Bowman.

$7.65 million grant to extend study of how climate change shapes life at 10,000 feet (CU Boulder Today)

Feb. 3, 2023

For more than 40 years, scientists from the Niwot Ridge Long-Term Ecological Research program have worked to better understand high-alpine ecosystems in a warming world. Thanks to a new $7.65 million, six-year grant from the National Science Foundation, that work will continue, making Niwot Ridge LTER the longest-running NSF-funded program at CU Boulder.

Lead author Erik Funk with a rosy-finch.

Rosy-finches are Colorado’s high-alpine specialists, and researchers want to know why (CU Boulder Today)

Jan. 20, 2023

Birds that can live at 14,000 feet and also breed at sea level might have evolved more quickly than previously thought, finds research led by Scott Taylor. The findings add to scientists’ understanding of biodiversity and may also help inform conservation decisions in the face of human-caused climate change.

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Scott Taylor

Bio

Education

Research

Publications

Effects of hybridization on cognition in chickadees: A common garden approach

Pages

Teaching

Courses

Outreach

News