Pennsylvania State University: The Perry Lab
What We Do
The Perry lab studies lemur evolutionary ecology and the history of human-lemur interactions in Madagascar using genomic-based methods, including nuclear genome sequencing and analysis.
Several of are projects are led by graduate students at the University of Antananarivo.
DNA Lab
We also have an ancient DNA lab for sequencing the complete mitochondrial and even nuclear genomes of the recently extinct, giant ‘subfossil’ lemurs. These data are used to to reconstruct aspects of their behavioral ecology and to make conservation-minded comparisons to the surviving lemur species.
Population Genomic Studies
Finally, as a complement to our lemur work, we have initiated population genomic studies of the people of Madagascar in order to describe the pattern and rate of the population size increase and better characterize the interesting origin and evolutionary history of the Malagasy.