AbstractsBiology & Animal Science

The aim of my doctoral work was to investigate the role of parasites in the evolution of host defenses and reproductive barriers. I first tested how ecology and specifically parasite-mediated selection could contribute to population differentiation and speciation in three-spined stickleback ecotypes. I then worked on assessing how paternal effects of parasite infection could evolve and be expressed. This thesis is organized in three chapters, presented in the form of independent manuscripts.