Woodrats survive on toxic creosote plants by copying detox genes, producing more enzymes to break down plant toxins and avoid ...

"These woodrats have only been exposed to creosote bush for about 15,000 years—in an evolutionary timescale ... animals just happened to have more copies of detox genes than others and were tolerant ...

Rob is an evolutionary ecologist who studies polyploidy and speciation in the creosote bush. Here at CU, he continued his creosote research and collaborated with Nolan Kane to develop genomic tools ...