Aleksey Maro
I am a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Notre Dame, funded through the Society of Science, working with the Archie Lab and the Amboseli Baboon Research Project.
I recently completed my Ph.D. Dissertation with Robert Dudley and the Dudley Lab in the Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley. The title of my thesis was: Towards a wild fermentation ecology: alcohol within floral nectar and the frugivorous diet of chimpanzees. All chapters have been published (see Publications).
[Global press coverage, talks and media interviews]
amaro@nd.edu
A path diagram describing the reciprocal mutualistic services of fruits, their seed dispersers, and yeasts. The Drunken Monkey hypothesis contributes the yeast portion of the triangle, arguing that attraction to ethanol can be adaptive for frugivores by, for example, acting as a long-distance olfactory signal of sugar calories. The yeast repays the fruit for its calories indirectly, by attracting seed dispersers. Yeasts are also thought to ecologically compete with spoilage microbes.
At the Amboseli Baboon Research Project Joint Lab Meeting in Leipzig, Germany in 2026 (top left)