Professor Peter Holland FRS

Academic Subject(s): Biology

Teaching

Biology MBiol: Diversity of Life; Genome Evolution; Evolution & Development.

Research

I am interested in how animal diversity relates to the evolution of the genome (the complete DNA sequence). When we compare genomes between animal species, we find examples of duplicated genes, novel genes, and sometimes the complete doubling of DNA. We aim to understand how these major genomic changes have contributed to the diversification of animals.

Our group is part of the ‘Darwin Tree of Life’ project, funded by the Wellcome Trust, which aims to sequence the genomes of all key species in the ecosystems of Britain and Ireland. We have already collected 2,500 animal species for this project, mostly from Wytham Woods near Oxford, and over 1,000 complete genomes have been sequenced. All data are freely available for anyone to analyse.