Anne Aulsebrook

Main focus:

I am a behavioural ecologist interested in activity patterns and sleep. During my PhD, I investigated the effects of urban light pollution on sleep in birds. More recently, I have become interested in the behavior of shorebirds that breed under constant daylight in the arctic. Previous research has shown substantial diversity in the activity patterns of these birds. Intriguingly, male pectoral sandpipers have the least sleep also have the greatest reproductive success. How do males attract females when they have had hardly any sleep? How does activity relate to reproductive success in other shorebirds, with different mating systems? To what extent can male shorebirds change their activity in different social contexts? These are some of the questions that I am exploring during my postdoctoral fellowship.