“The electric organs of fishes offer another case of special difficulty; it is impossible to conceive by what steps these wondrous organs have been produced…"
- Charles Darwin The Origin of Species
From genes to behavior, we investigate how evolution rewires biology to create something new. Using electric fish—nature’s repeat experiment in evolving electricity—we explore how genomes give rise to novel traits, how signals shape communication and speciation, and what these discoveries reveal about the origins of biodiversity.
Why Electric Fish?
Electric fish represent evolution’s repeat experiments. Unlike traits that evolved only once (wings, feathers, limbs), electric organs have independently evolved six times across vertebrates. Each time, evolution rewired muscle into a biological battery—producing electric fields for communication, navigation, and sometimes defense or predation.
Because these origins are independent yet strikingly similar, electric fish provide a powerful natural laboratory for answering one of biology’s biggest questions: How do genomes give rise to novel traits, and why does evolution repeat itself?
About Our Work
The Gallant Lab combines fieldwork in Central Africa, genomics and bioinformatics, physiology, developmental biology, and animal behavior to explore how new traits evolve.
Our research focuses on four themes:
- Building electric fish into a powerful model system for evolutionary biology (genomics, CRISPR, and transgenics).
- Origins of electric organs — how evolution repeatedly transforms muscle into electricity-producing cells.
- Evolution of electric signals — why fish signals diversify, and how they shape communication, behavior, and speciation.
- Reproductive evolution — from unusual sperm biology to breeding strategies that influence species’ trajectories.
Together, these studies reveal the rules of innovation in evolution and highlight how biodiversity arises at the intersection of genes, development, and ecology.