Cock Van Oosterhout

Cock van Oosterhout did his PhD on captive metapopulations of the butterfly Bicyclus anynana at Leiden University in the Netherlands under the supervision of Paul Brakefield. He moved to the UK in 1998 where he worked on guppies (Poecilia reticulata) at the University of Hull. He received an NERC Fellowship testing conservation genetic breeding protocols, reintroduction and genetic supplementation programs using guppies as an empirical model and did this research in Hull and Trinidad. He developed software applications, including Micro-Checker for population genetic analysis of microsatellites, as well as models of host-parasite coevolution and population genetic simulations, and more recently, he designed software for whole genome analysis of recombination (Hybrid-Check).

He works on a wide range of species, including guppies, cichlids, plant parasites (aphids and oomycetes), diatoms and the pink pigeon, and he is particularly interested in the evolution of immune and resistance genes, and effector genes. He is currently a Professor of Evolutionary Genetics at the University of East Anglia and acts as Deputy Director of the Earth and Life Systems Alliance (ELSA), collaborating with researchers across Norwich Research Park (NRP).