Department of Biological Science

Office :	116-E Westcott Building
Office :	(850) 644-7800
Fax :
Mail code:	1310
E-mail :	labele@mailer.fsu.edu

Professor Emeritus;
Ph.D., University of Miami, 1972
Graduate faculty status

Research and Professional Interests:

Past research interests include classical crustacean systematics, ecology, and biogeography. More recently, focus has shifted to crustacean molecular systematics and evolution. Ongoing research projects encompass the use of nuclear 18S ribosomal DNA sequence data to infer higher-order phylogenetic relationships among the major crustacean taxa. Molecularly based phylogeneies can then be used as an independent test of evolutionary theories based on morphological characters. Additional projects include the use of mitochondrial DNA sequence data to address questions of crustacean speciation.

Selected Publications:

Abele, L. G., W. Kim, and B. E. Felgenhauer. 1989. Molecular evidence for inclusion of the phylum Pentastomida in the Crustacea. Molecular Biology and Evolution 6:685-691.

Abele, L. G. 1991. Comparison of morphological and molecular phylogeny of the Decapoda. Memoirs of the Queensland Museum 31:101-108.

Abele, L. G., T. Spears, W. Kim, and M. Applegate. 1992. Phylogeny of selected maxillopodan and other crustacean taxa based on 18S ribosomal nucleotide sequences: a preliminary analysis. Acta Zoologica (Stockholm) 73:373-382.

Spears, T., L. G. Abele, and M. A. Applegate. 1994. Phylogenetic study of cirripedes and selected relatives (Thecostraca) basedon 18S rDNA sequence analysis. Journal of Crustacean Biology 14:641-656.

DeBry, R. W., and L. G. Abele. 1995. The relationship between parsimony and maximum-likelihood analyses: tree scores and confidence estimates for three real data sets. Mol. Biol. Evol. 12:291-297.

Spears, T., and L. G. Abele. 1997. Crustacean phylogeny inferred from 18S rDNA. In Arthropod Relationships. Systematics Association Special Volume Series 55. R. A. Fortey and R. H. Thomas, editors. Chapman and Hall, London. 169-187.

Spears, T., and L. G. Abele. 1999. The phylogenetic relationships of crustaceans with foliaceous limbs: an 18S rDNA study of Branchiopoda, Cephalocarida, and Phyllocarida. J. Crust. Biol. 19:825-843.

Spears, T., and L. G. Abele. 2000. Branchiopod monophyly and interordinal phylogeny inferred from 18S ribosomal DNA. J. Crust. Biol. 20:1-24.