DREW Wham

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        I’m a statistical geneticist at The Pennsylvania State University. I use large datasets to find hidden groups and I use the relationship between the individuals in those groups to learn about the processes that caused those groups to form. Some of my major projects have focused on detecting and naming new species, predicting the number of unique individuals in clonal populations and inferring the rate of clonal reproduction.

        I’m broadly interested in making predictions from data. I’m particularly interested in problems that involve hidden groups and data that comes from individuals that are related by observable or un-observable networks. I recently defended my PhD thesis: The Origin, Meaning, And Detection Of Clusters In Population Genetic Data.

Publications

Wham DC, LaJeunesse TC (2016) Symbiodinium population genetics: Testing for species boundaries and analyzing samples with mixed genotypes. Molecular Ecology. 10.1111/mec.13623

Davies SW, Wham DC, Kanke MR, Matz MV (2016) Ecological factors rather than physical barriers to dispersal shape genetic structure of algal symbionts in horizontally-transmitting corals. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Molecular Ecology

Lee MJ, Jeong HJ, Jang SH, Lee SY, Kang NS, Lee KH,  Wham DC, LaJeunesse TC (2016) Most low-abundence "background" Symbiodinium spp. are transitory and have minimal functional significance for symbiotic corals. Microbial Ecology  1-13.

Pettay DT, Wham DC, Smith RT, Iglasias-Prieto R, LaJeunesse TC (2015) Microbial invasion of the Caribbean by an Indo-Pacific coral zooxanthella. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 112:7513-7518.

LaJeunesse TC, Forsman ZH, Wham DC (2015) An Indo-West Pacific 'zooxanthella' invasive to the western Atlantic, finds its way to the Eastern Pacific via an introduced Caribbean coral. Coral Reefs.

LaJeunesse TC, Wham DC, Pettay DT, Parkinson JE, Keshavmurthy S, Chen CA (2014) Ecologically differentiated, stress tolerant endosymbionts in the dinoflagellate genus Symbiodinium Clade D are different species. Phycologia

Thornhill DJ, Lewis A, Wham DC, LaJeunesse TC (2014) Host-specialist lineages dominate the adaptive radiation of reef coral endosymbionts. Evolution 68:352-267.

Wham DC, Carmichael M, LaJeunesse TC (2013) Microsatellite loci for Symbiodinium goreaui and other clade C Symbiodinium. Conservation Genetics Resources.

Wham, DC. Carmichael M.,Reimer J. and LaJeunesse T. (2013) Eight polymorphic microsatellite loci for the Indo-Pacific wide zoanthid, Zoanthus sansibaricus. Marine Biodiversity.

Wham DC, Pettay DT, LaJeunesse TC. (2011) Microsatellite loci for the host-generalist “zooxanthella” Symbiodinium trenchi and other Clade D Symbiodinium. Conservation Genetic Resources 3:3, 541-544. 

Articles on the web

Identify this: Zoanthids 

A description of the Zoanthids commonly encountered in the aquarium trade. 

Wiki:Mixed Fermentations

A Wiki page on mixed microbial fermentation that Dan Pixley and I worked on together.