Martha Muñoz has been named as an assistant professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, part of the Virginia Tech College of Science.

Before arriving at Virginia Tech, Muñoz worked as a post-doctoral researcher at the Australian National University and then North Carolina’s Duke University. She earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Boston University in 2007 and a doctoral degree in organismic and evolutionary biology from Harvard University in 2014.

In addition to working in the the Department of Biological Sciences, Muñoz is an affiliated faculty member of Global Change Center at Virginia Tech, part of the Fralin Life Science Institute. Her research focuses on linking ecology and evolution to understand how biodiversity arises, in addition to connecting recent and deep-time evolution, studying evolutionary physiology and related responses to climate change, and understanding morphological diversity through evolutionary biomechanics.

This past fall, Muñoz led a study published in the journal American Naturalist that showed behavior can be both a brake and a motor for evolution in a manner where slowing evolution in one trait actually requires accelerating evolution in another.

Muñoz is one of 22 tenured and tenure-track faculty members to join the College of Science this year.

 

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