Genetic and behavioral approaches to primate evolution
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, welcomes Jenny Tung as new Director
Evolutionary biologist and geneticist Jenny Tung has joined the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (MPI-EVA) as a new Director. She joins us from Duke University in the United States, where she is an Associate Professor in the Department of Evolutionary Anthropology and affiliate of the Duke Population Research Institute. Jenny Tung is interested in primate behavior, life history, and evolution, including their relevance to human health and primate conservation.
Understanding primate evolution is central to understanding human evolution. Living primates provide irreplaceable models for the social, ecological, and evolutionary processes that have shaped our species. In turn, they are essential for establishing the points of difference that make humans unique. At MPI-EVA, Tung’s new Department of Primate Behavior and Evolution will build on this foundation by unifying organismal perspectives on behavior, life history and evolution with molecular and genetic approaches that provide previously unobtainable insights. “Our mission is to uncover the patterns and processes that guide primate evolution, produce applied knowledge with relevance to human health and primate conservation, and build capacity for primate research everywhere”, says Tung.
Jenny Tung studied Evolutionary Biology at Duke University in the United States. She received her Ph.D. at Duke University investigating the causes and consequences of genetic variation in wild baboons, under the supervision of Susan Alberts and Gregory Wray. She spent her postdoctoral studies investigating the functional genomic signature of genotype and social environment in nonhuman primates at the University of Chicago, under the supervision of Yoav Gilad. In 2012, she joined the Department of Evolutionary Anthropology and the Duke Population Research Institute at Duke University. While at Duke, Tung investigated the genetic and genomic consequences of social environmental variation in baboons, rhesus macaques, and other social mammals, as well as the role of behavior in primate hybridization. Tung co-directs the Amboseli Baboon Research Project, one of the longest-running primate field sites in the world. She started her position as a director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, in 2022.
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The MPI-EVA was founded in 1997. Its six current departments bring together researchers from more than 30 countries and with various scientific backgrounds. Their common aim is to investigate the history of humankind from an interdisciplinary perspective. In doing so, they draw on comparative analyses of genes, cultures, cognitive abilities and social systems of past and present human populations as well as those of primates closely related to human beings.
Contact:
Sandra Jacob
Press Officer
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig
+49 341 3550-122
jacob@[>>> Please remove the text! <<<]eva.mpg.de