James Hanken

Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology, Curator in Herpetology, and Director, Museum of Comparative Zoology
Professor of Biology, Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology

Phone: 617-495-2496
E-mail:
Office: 109C MCZ, 26 Oxford Street

Website: http://www.oeb.harvard.edu/faculty/hanken

I study the evolution of morphology, developmental biology, and systematics. Most work by my group focuses on amphibians but otherwise addresses a wide range of topics, taxa, and methodologies. The latter range from laboratory-based molecular analyses to extensive field surveys. Current subjects include the evolution of craniofacial patterning in vertebrates; the developmental basis of life-history evolution; systematics, taxonomy and evolution of African frogs and neotropical and Asian salamanders; and amphibian declines and conservation. Active field programs are maintained in Mexico, Argentina, China, Africa, and Sri Lanka, and my laboratory serves as a community research facility for NSF’s AmphibiaTree project.

Recent Publications

Wake, D. B., J. M. Savage, and J. Hanken. 2007. Montane salamanders from the Costa Rica-Panamá border region, with descriptions of two new species of Bolitoglossa. Copeia 2007(3). In press.

Kerney, R. R., M. Meegaskumbura, K. Manamendra-Arachchi and J. Hanken. 2007. Cranial ontogeny in Philautus silus (Anura: Ranidae: Rhacophorinae) reveals few similarities with other direct-developing anurans. Journal of Morphology 268: 715–725.

Kerney, R., J. Gross, and J. Hanken. 2007. Runx2 is essential for larval hyobranchial cartilage formation in Xenopus laevis. Developmental Dynamics 236: 1650–1662.

Parra, G., R. Brown, J. Hanken, B. Hedges, R. Heyer, S. Kuzmin, E. Lavilla, S. Lötters, B. Pimenta, S. Richards, M. O. Rödel, R. O. de Sá, and D. B. Wake. 2007. Systematics and conservation. In Amphibian Conservation Action Plan (C. Gascon, J. P. Collins, R. D. Moore, D. R. Church, J. E. McKay, and J. R. Mendelson III, eds.), pp. 45-48. IUCN/SSC Amphibian Specialist Group, Gland, Switzerland, and Cambridge, UK.

Gross, J. B., J. Hanken, E. Oglesby, and N. Marsh-Armstrong. 2006. Use of a ROSA26:GFP transgenic line for long-term Xenopus fate-mapping studies. Journal of Anatomy 209: 401–413..

Courses Taught

FRSEMR 41u: Museums
OEB 167: Herpetology
OEB 269: Biodiversity in Crisis: Worldwide Amphibian Declines and Extinctions
OEB 261r: Developmental Mechanisms of Evolutionary Change