Regular biography
Dr. Erin Macartney is a researcher at The University of Sydney, affiliated with the BIO department. Her research focuses on understanding the factors that shape traits important for individual health and fitness, with a particular emphasis on the effects of diet on reproduction and offspring health. Her work spans environmental, genetic, and epigenetic factors influencing behavioral, phenotypic, and metabolic traits. By combining experimental work with insects and mice and quantitative syntheses such as meta-analyses, Dr. Macartney addresses questions at both primary and secondary levels, enabling a comprehensive understanding of how various genetic and non-genetic factors influence life-history strategies. Her integrative approach provides insights with implications for evolutionary biology and health and disease prevention.
Scholar-generated biography
Erin Macartney is an evolutionary ecologist whose research focuses on sexual selection, life history strategies, sperm competition, and nongenetic inheritance. Her work explores how environmental factors influence reproductive traits and their evolutionary implications. Macartney employs meta-analytical approaches to synthesize findings across studies, examining topics such as the effects of nutrient limitation on sperm quality, temperature impacts on animal reproduction, and the role of paternal epigenetic effects. Her research also addresses methodological transparency in scientific reporting and the visibility of academic work. By integrating ecological and evolutionary perspectives, she investigates how environmental conditions shape reproductive success and intergenerational phenotypic variation.