Directrice de recherche (DR1)

CEFE/CNRS
Campus du CNRS
1919, route de Mende
34293 Montpellier 5

E-mail : anne.charmantier[at]cefe.cnrs.fr

Thèmes de recherche: Evolution et génétique quantitative dans les populations naturelles; sénescence; sélection sexuelle.

 ClaireDoutrelant

Tenure CNRS research scientist (DR)

CEFE CNRS 1919 Rte de Mende, 34293 Montpellier

Tél : +33/0 4 67 61 32 60 / This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

My research is centered in the theoretical framework of evolutionary ecology, population biology and behavioural ecology. My projects aim at understanding life history variation in order to determine the adaptive and evolutionary processes that explain and maintain animal diversity. I´m particularly interested by three kinds of life history traits linked to behavior: cooperation, animal communication and maternal invesment. I'm mainly using birds as biological models. I'm mainly using empirical methods, including large-scale experiments and analyses of long-term data sets on different populations of passerine birds in the field.

I'm currently working on four main projects. 1) Evolution of colour ormentation in birds(with a special focus on female coloration and blue tits) 2) the cause and life history traits consequences of cooperation in sociable weavers ; 3) Sexual and social evolution on islands, and 4) the evolution of weaver nests.

I'm also part of  the Arts-Sciences project Obô and the association https://plumesetracines.net/

1 - Evolution of ornementation in birds

 Photos: Claire Doutrelant

Team: Arnaud GREGOIRE(Lecturer, Univ Montpellier), Amélie FARGEVIEILLE (post Doc), David LóPEZ-IDIáQUEZ (Post doc), Lisa SANDMEYER (PhD Student)

Collaborations: Anne CHARMANTIER(CEFE),  Denis REALE(UQUAM, Canada), Céline TEPLITSKY(CEFE), Doris GOMEZ(CEFE),   Julien RENOULT (CEFE),  RIta COVAS(CIBIO Portugal, FizPatrick Institute SA); Maria DEL REY (spectrophotometric measurements), Christophe de FRANCESCHI(field work and data base management), Samuel PERRET(Field work and Patch measurements), Annick LUCAS(Field work and Patch measurements), Pablo GIOVANNINI(Field work)

* Evolution of female colour ornementation

In this project we use a combination of empirical and comparative approaches to address three fundamental questions on sexual and social selection in both monomorphic species and dimorphic species in which females present conspicuous traits. Our questions are the following (i) Are female conspicuous traits under sexual /social selection ? (ii) Do female conspicuous traits reflect female quality and which mechanisms maintain signal honesty? (iii) What are the population consequences of female signalling and mutual sexual selection.

Examples of publications (full list below)

Fargevieille, A., Grégoire, A., Gomez, D. & Doutrelant, C. 2023Evolution of female color in birds: the role of paternal care and female reproductive costs.Journal of evolutionary ecology. 36(3), 579-588

Doutrelant, C., Fargevieille, A., Grégoire, A.  2020.Evolution of female coloration: what have we learned from birds in general and blue tits in particular. Adv. Study in Behaviour PDF

 Photo Claire Doutrelant

 * Evolution of plumage ornement in space and time

Selection often varies in space and time and long-term research that spans broad spatial scales is needed to understand the factors driving phenotypic variation and to assess the links between traits and fitness.  To assess the importance of spatiotemporal variation  and its consequences on selection estimates, we collected data on two study systems: (i) the blue tit (yellow and UV-blue colorationsmeasured by spectrophotometry since 2005, 600 birds measured each year); (ii) the  size of the sociable weaver melanin patch  since 2010 (the bib patch is photographied each year on 400 individuals)

Examples of publications (full list below)

 Lopez-Idiaquez, D.; Teplitsky, C.; Grégoire, A.; Fargevieille, F.; del Rey, M.; de Franceschi, C.; Charmantier, A.; Doutrelant, C. 2022. Long-term decrease in colouration: a consequence of climate change? American Naturalist https://doi.org/10.1086/719655   

Dominance interaction -  Photo Franck Théron

2 -Evolution and consequences of cooperation

 *TEAM: Co Pi: Rita COVAS(http://www.fitzpatrick.uct.ac.za/fitz/staff/research/covas; CIBIO, Portugal), André FERREIRA (Univ. Zurich), Franck THERON (data base managmer and field), Liliana SILVA (video manager and machine Learning methods) Jorge Garcia Campa (Post doc),  Gabriel Munar(Post doc), Babette FOURIE (PhD Student), Nicolas  SILVA(PhD Student), Marta MARMELO (PhD Student); , Fanny RYBAK(Univ Orsay, FR),

*Collaboration:  Matthieu PAQUET(Swenden), François CRISCUOLO& Sandrine ZAHN(Univ Strasbourg, FR),  Julien Renoult(CEFE, FR)

           Website: https://sociableweaverproject.com/

The project aims at understanding the fitness bases of cooperation and the consequences of cooperation for population dynamics through its effects on reproductive output, survival and dispersal. Our study model is an endemic passerine bird from southern African passerine. This bird is a cooperative breeder. In cooperatively breeding species, mature individuals called ‘helpers’ assist the breeding pairs by bringing additional food to the nest. We work on the evolution of different cooperative behaviours – cooperative breeding, nest building and predator mobbing and on the relationship between cooperation, fitness, dispersal and long-term population dynamics.

Currently our project has two main aims: (i) determining whether sexual or social selection play a role in the evolution of cooperation and thus the role of partner choice ; (ii) determining  how presence / absence of co-operators affects maternal effects and parental investments

This project is suppported by the PercyFizpatric Institute of the University of Cape Town & the INEE - CNRS: Long-term Studies in Ecology and Evolution (SEE-Life)

http://www.fitzpatrick.uct.ac.za/fitz/research/programmes/longterm/sociableweaver

Examples of publications (full list below)

D'Amelio, P.; Ferreira, A.; Fortuna, R.; Paquet, M.; Silva, L. ; Theron, F.; Doutrelant, C.; Covas, R. 2022. Disentangling climatic and nest predator impact on reproductive output reveals adverse high temperature effects regardless of helper number in an arid-region cooperative bird Ecology Letter25(1), 151-162

Covas, R., Lardy, S.; Silva, L.; Rey, B.; Ferreira, A. C.; Théron, F.; Tognetti, A.; Faivre, B. Doutrelant, C. 2022.The oxidative cost of helping and its minimisation in a cooperative breeder Behavioural Ecology33(3), 504-517

Ferreira, A., Silva, L., Renna, F., Brandl, H. B., Renoult, J., Farine, D., Covas, R. & Doutelant, C.  2020 Deep learning based methods for individual recognition in small birds. Method in Ecol Evol PDF

Covas, R. & Doutrelant, C.* 2019. Testing the sexual and social benefits of cooperation in animals. Trends Ecol Evol In press. *Both authors contributed equally to the manuscript PDF

Photos: Claire Doutrelant

  3- Evolution on islands

TEAM:  Rita Covas (CIBIO, Portugal), FitzPatrick Institute, Univ Cape Town), Martim Melo(CIBIO),  Claire Loiseau ( Univ Montpellier), Ana Leitao (Post doc ); Raquel Ponti (Post doc)

             Website: https://islandbirdproject.com/

Islands are unique ecosystems sharing a distinctive set of characteristics that make them particularly interesting to study adaptation by organisms. The isolation and reduced area of islands result in simplified ecological ecosystems and an impoverished fauna that are expected to lead to convergent patterns of adaptation (the ‘insularity syndrome’). Our aim is to establish, using comparative work , whether island birds worldwide display such convergent shift for ornamentation, songs, behaviour and morphology. Then we aim at determining which factors lead to those changes and are particularly interested by the role of parasitism and interspecific competition. We worked on data collected in natural history museum and in the field (Sao Tome, Madeira, Gabon, Cameroun).

Examples of publications (full list below)

Ponti, R., Doutrelant, C., & Covas, R. (2023). Strength of the ‘island rule’in birds is positively associated with absence of avian predators.Biology Letters, 19(3), 20220536

Barthe, M., Doutrelant, C., Covas, R., Melo, M., Illera, J. C., Tilak, M. K.,... & Nabholz, B. (2022). Evolution of immune genes in island birds: reduction in population sizes can explain island syndrome. Peer Community Journal, 2.

Robert, A., Melo, M., Lengagne, T.,. Julien, S..& Doutrelant, C. 2021Patterns of bird song evolution on islands support the character release hypothesis in tropical but not in temperate latitudes. Journal of Evolutionary Biology34(10), 1580-1591

Bliard, L., Robert, A. Paquet, M, Renoult, J., Grégoire, A., Crochet, P.A. Covas, R & Doutrelant, C. 2020 Examining the link between relaxed predation and bird colouration on islands.  Biol Lett PDF

Robert, A., Lengagne, T., Melo, M., Julien, S.., Gardette, V. Covas, R. & Doutrelant, C.2019. The Theory of Island Biogeography and Soundscapes: species diversity and the organization of acoustic communities. J. Biogeography PDF

Doutrelant, C.,Paquet,Renoult, J. M. Grégoire, A., Crochet, P.A. Covas, R. 2016 Worldwide patterns of bird colouration on islands. Ecology Letter  19: 537–545 PDF

 Photos: Claire Doutrelant & Martim Melo
 

 4 - Weaver nest as an extended phenotype

Team : Rita Covas (CIBIO, Portugal), FitzPatrick Institute, Univ Cape Town), Julien Renoult (CEFE), Erwan Harscouet(phD CEFE),  Dieter Oschadleus(Univ. Cape Town) , Staffan Andersson(Univ.  Gothenburg), Fanny Rybak(Univ. Paris Sud)

 We investigate the role of sexual selection on the evolution and diversification of i) nest weaving (the extended phenotype) and on colours, songs, and flight displays.

5-Long term monitoring of blue tit (worked initiated by Jacques Blondel in 1976)

Researchers: Jacques Blondel, Samuel Caro,Anne Charmantier, Claire Doutrelant,,Christophe de Francheschi,  Pablo Giovannini, Arnaud Grégoire, Marcel Lambrechts, Annick Lucas, Samuel Perret,  Philippe Perret,Denis Réale(Canada),Céline Teplltsky

This program  is supported but the INEE - CNRS: Long-term Studies in Ecology and  Evolution (SEE-Life)

https://data.oreme.org/tit/home   & https://oreme.org/observation/ecopop/mesanges/

https://mesangecefe1.wixsite.com/mesangecefe

Photos Claire Doutrelant

 6 - Obô, an art science projet

An art science project with Claire Loiseau, Martim Melo, Hélène Fromen & Maya Cylarem

Project funded by European comission - Biopolis with the help of the CNRS, CEFE. A first sponsor: Ornithomedia

Posted by Maya Cyclarem & Ayline Le Sourd

website: https://plumesetracines.net/

7- Short CV

8 - Publications

update list: https://scholar.google.fr/citations?hl=fr&user=Fap-wf0AAAAJ

Do not hesitate to ask for reprint !

9 - Funding

Investigatrice principale (PI)

* 2020-2024        ANR Extended phenotype.The evolution of extended phenotypes and associated signals in animals: weaverbirds’ nests and sexual selection as a case study?  With R Covas (CIBIO, Univ Porto, F Rybak (Univ Paris Sud), Julien Renoult

* 2018-2019        CEMEB Montpellier Explanatory Research Project Relaxed selection at immunity genes in insular populations ? A test using a population genomics approach With B Naboltz R Covas, M Melo, C. Loiseau

* 2018- ..             OSU OREME Suivi de la phénologie de reproduction du Républicain Social.

* 2015-2019       ANR défis de tous les savoir Can cooperation be under social or sexual selection?  With R Covas (CIBIO, Univ Porto, B Faivre (Univ Dijon), F Rybak (Univ Paris Sud)

* 2016-2018                 PEPS CNRS INEE Paysage Rôle de la compétition interspécifique dans la structuration des paysages acoustiques .  With A Robert (Phd), M Melo (Univ Porto), T Lengagne (CNRS, Lyon).

* 2012-2015         Bourse chercheur d'avenir Région Languedoc Roussillon Sélection sexuelle femelle chez les oiseaux : réalité, origine et conséquences populationnelles - With Arnaud Grégoire, Doris Gomez, Anne Charmantier

*2009-2013         ANR JCJCSélection sexuelle, sociale et évolution des ornements femelles. WithArnaud Grégoire, Doris Gomez, Anne Charmantier, B. Doligez

Co Pi

* 2020-2025        ERC Consolidator COOPERATIVE PARTNER. Pi R Covas

* 2016-2018         Portuguese Science and Technology Foundation (FCT)- Direct benefits of cooperation.PI Rita Covas

*2013-2016         Programme Européen Marie Curie-IRSES Cooperation. Pi Rita Covas. coPI C. Doutrelant, B. Hatchwell,

*2013-2015         FCT + National geographic:Parasite pressure, immunity and sexual ornaments in island and mainland birds.

* 2010-2013         FCT Maternal effects and cooperation Pi Rita Covas,

* 2010- ..             OSU OREME. Suivi de la phénologie de reproduction de la mésange bleue. co Pi A. Charmantier C. Doutrelant, A. Grégoire, M. Lambrechts, C. Téplitsky

*2008 – …         Centre of Excellence FitzPatrick Institute (Af du Sud): Cooperative breeding in sociable weavers Co Pi Rita Covas C. Doutrelant

 I'm always looking for motivated students and post doc to build / work on project! Do not hesitate to contact me with a CV to share your interest!

Maitre de Conférences (EPHE)

CEFE/CNRS
Campus du CNRS
1919, route de Mende
34293 Montpellier 5

 tél : 33 (0)4 67 61 33 04
 fax: 33 (0)4 67 41 21 38

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

 THEMES DE RECHERCHE

Mes thèmes de recherche concernent la phylogénie, la phylogéographie et l'évolution moléculaire à partir de l'analyse des séquences de gènes mitochondriaux et nucléaires. L’objectif est de répondre, à l’aide de l’outil moléculaire, à des questions de biodiversité et systématique évolutive à l’échelle des vertébrés (mammifères, amphibiens et reptiles). Je m’intéresse aussi à l’échelle temporelle (datations moléculaires) des différents niveaux de diversifications ce qui permet de confronter les inférences moléculaires avec les données morphologiques, paléontologiques et biogéographiques.

PhD STUDENT
Behavioural Ecology

My PhD project, which began in December 2024, is in the field of behavioral ecology. More specifically, I am studying the impact of personality on the reproductive behavior of Corsican blue tits Cyanistes caeruleus ogliastrae in the face of biotic (predation, parasitism) and abiotic (climate change) constraints.

Aside from my thesis, my main research topics of interest include reproductive behaviour, in particular sexual selection, host-parasite interactions, and the links between anthropogenic factors and behaviour. I have a preference for birds as a study model, but have also worked on fish and mammals.

I am also a member of the Comité pour l'Equité.

Contact :

CEFE - CNRS
1919, route de Mende
34293 Montpellier Cedex 5

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Bluesky : @radicalmoineau.bsky.social

ORCID : 0009-0006-2079-7362

Supervisors :

• Anne Charmantier (Researcher, CEFE - CNRS)
• Claire Doutrelant (Researcher, CEFE - CNRS)
• Denis Réale (Researcher, UQAM)

PhD title: Links between personality and reproductive strategy in a context of biotic (predation, parasitism) and abiotic (climate) environmental variability

In a context of rapid global warming and increasingly frequent extreme weather events, numerous studies have shown the impact of these changes on the life-history traits of wild organisms, in particular the advancement of reproduction phenology for plants and animals. In the case of birds, we know that many populations respond to global warming by adjusting individual egg-laying dates. However, much less is known about the functional reasons for individual differences in this plasticity, and very little about the implications of inter-individual behavioural (personalities) or demographic (e.g.  longevity) differences in the phenotypic plasticity of reproductive decisions.

In this thesis:

• We will exploit a database resulting from long-term monitoring of blue tits (Cyanistes caeruleus) initiated in 1976 and now providing 47 years of data on bird reproduction, and 13 years of behavioural data (docility, exploration score) on breeding birds in four populations occupying white oak and holm oak forests.
• We will test whether the differences in bird personalities  (proactive/reactive, i.e. highly or less aggressive and fast or meticulous explorers) between populations and individuals, are linked to the plasticity of life-history traits in the face of global warming. In particular, we predict that because of their different reactivity to environmental signals, proactive individuals will be less plastic than reactive individuals in their reproductive decisions.
• We will also study the effects of environmental pressures (climate, predation, parasitism) and personality on the pairing of individuals approximated by homogamy and the propensity to divorce. In particular, we will use repeated observation data collected over several decades to test the hypothesis that proactive individuals are more likely to change partners over the breeding seasons, particularly following failure events such as the predation of their brood or an extreme
  climatic event.

The overall aim of this project is to integrate animal personalities in the study of phenotypic plasticity in the face of environmental constraints, in the context of a study of wild birds initiated almost half a century ago.

 Education:

• 2016 - 2018   CPGE BCPST
                      Lycée Joffre, Montpellier
• 2018 - 2023   Interface programme in Biology, Health, and Physiopathology
                      Ecole Normale Supérieure Paris-Saclay
  
• 2019 - 2023   Veterinary studies (double degree with ENS)
                      Ecole Nationale Vétérinaire d'Alfort
  
• 2022 - 2023   M2 BEE specialised in Evolutionary Ecology
                      Université Paris-Saclay - Sorbonne Universités
  
• 2023 - 2024   Wildlife rehabilitator                                                                                                        Centre de Sauvegarde de la Faune Sauvage à Chambéry

Internships :

• 2019  Center for Biological Diversity - St-Andrews, UK
  
  • Supervised by Helen Spence-Jones and Mike Webster
• 2020  CEBC - Chizé, France
  
  • Supervised by Sydney Hope and Frédéric Angelier
• 2022  Cornell University (Leadership Program) - Ithaca, NY, USA
  
  • Supervised by Michael Sheehan
• 2023  Helsinki Institute of Life Sciences - Helsinki, Finland
  
  • Supervised by Rose Thorogood

Publications :

Vogt, C. C.; Zipple, M. N.; Sprockett, D. D.; Miller, C. H.; Hardy, S. X.; Arthur, M. K.; Greenstein, A. M.; Colvin, M. S.; Michel, L. M.; Moeller, A. H.; Sheehan, M. J. Female Behavior Drives the Formation of Distinct Social Structures in C57BL/6J versus Wild-Derived Outbred Mice in Field Enclosures. BMC Biol. 2024, 22 (1), 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12915-024-01809-0.

Conferences :

• 2023                        Animal Behaviour Live: Annual Online Conference - Presentation   
• 2022                        National Veterinary Scholars Symposium (Minneapolis) - Poster              
• 2022                        Forum de la Formation Vétérinaire (Maisons-Alfort) - Conférence "Vétérinaire dans la Recherche"
• 2021                        Forum de la Formation Vétérinaire (Maisons-Alfort) - Conférence "Vétérinaire dans la Recherche"
• 2020                        Soirée recherche de l'ENVA - Presentation

Directeur d'Etude Emerite (EPHE)

CEFE/CNRS
Campus du CNRS
1919, route de Mende
34293 Montpellier 5

tél : +33 4 67 61 33 43

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
 
Thématiques : Incendies ou brûlages,  dynamique du paysage, et faune : écologie des perturbations et conservation.

CNRS Researcher

Head of the Behavioural Ecology team

CEFE/CNRS
Campus du CNRS
1919, route de Mende
34293 Montpellier cedex 5

Bureau 208