Fireflies in the western US...wait, what?
The main species we are studying is Pyractomena dispersa a species that does flash as an adult (see the link below). Our overall goal is to understand where the populations of this species are, which ones may have gone extinct as well as the population genetics of the group. Oh ya, and we're also doing our taxonomic homework because there is some evidence this may actually be a new species...
Over the last few years a group of researchers from two Utah universities have launched a citizen science page to help us track populations. We have also begun studying the visual system of this species by trying to figure out how it sees color and finds mates.
The genome of the Photinus pyralis, the main goal of our genome effort will be a massive tool for us as it will allow us to further refine our population genetic studies and see where the genes that underly color vision are found within the genome and how they have evolved in comparison to P. dispersa.
In case you didn't follow the link above here it is again: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=byu+f...
And two other links that leads to our citizen science project:
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