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Research

Entomology

MetaInformAnt

Ento-Linguistics

From ~2010-2023, my main training and research was in

Entomology⁠

Also 2024 looking forward, I hope to remain active long-term in Entomological

Research⁠

, for example through:

The

Active InferAnts⁠

project at

AII Onboarding⁠

The

MetaInformAnt⁠

project (direct

link to MetaInformAnt Coda⁠

⁠

Interactions⁠

with

Philosophy⁠

Ento-Linguistics⁠

⁠

Postdoctoral Research (2020-2023)

From 2020 through 2023, I did postdoctoral research (co-mentored by

Professor Brian Johnson at UC Davis⁠

and

Professor Tim Linksvayer at Texas Tech⁠

). I was an NSF postdoctoral research fellow in Biology. Our collaborative research is focused on making scalable, reproducible, and transparent bioinformatic pipelines, so that we can apply modern genomic techniques to address fundamental questions in biology. We take a behavioral ecological perspective on the eusocial insects, while also highlighting the importance of complex gene families, taxonomically-restricted loci, tissue-specific gene expression patterns, distributed physiology, and colony-level cognitive processes.

2023, "

A variational synthesis of evolutionary and developmental dynamics⁠

", K Friston, DA Friedman, A Constant, VB Knight, C Fields, T Parr, JO Campbell; Entropy

https://doi.org/10.3390/e25070964⁠

⁠

2023, "

A single-pheromone model accounts for empirical patterns of ant colony foraging previously modeled using two pheromones⁠

" E Saund, DA Friedman, Cognitive Systems Research, DOI: 10.1016/j.cogsys.2023.02.005

⁠

2021, "⁠

⁠

Active inferants: The basis for an active inference framework for ant colony behavior⁠

", DA Friedman, A Tschantz, MJD Ramstead, KJ Friston, A Constant, in Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience | doi: 10.3389/fnbeh.2021.647732

⁠

Graduate Research (2014-2019)

My PhD thesis research was in the

lab of Professor Deborah Gordon⁠

at Stanford University. We studied collective behavior in the red harvester ant Pogonomyrmex barbatus. My project explored the biology that underlies the regulation of ant colony traits such as collective foraging. I used multiple types of technologies to understand foraging behavior from the perspective of collective decision-making, neurophysiology, ecology, and evolution. My thesis work and related ant research were published as: 2020, Communications Biology, “Gene expression variation in the brains of harvester ant foragers is associated with collective behavior”. DA Friedman, RA York, AT Hilliard, DM Gordon. 2020, Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry, “Measurement of natural variation of neurotransmitter tissue content in red harvester ant brains among different colonies.". Shin M, Friedman DA, Gordon DM, Venton BJ, 2019, Science Reports, “The physiology of forager hydration and variation among harvester ant (Pogonomyrmex barbatus) colonies in collective foraging“ DA Friedman, M Greene, DM Gordon. 2018, iScience, “The role of dopamine in the regulation of foraging in the red harvester ant”. DA Friedman, A Pilko, D Skowronska-Krawczyk, KM Krasinska, J Parker, J Hirsh, DM Gordon. . 2018, PLoS One, “Foraging behavior and locomotion of the invasive Argentine ant from winter aggregations” BP Burford, Lee G, Friedman DA, Brachmann E, Khan R, MacArthur-Waltz D, McCarty A, Gordon DM. 2016, Proc. Royal Soc. B., “Context-dependent expression of the foraging gene in field colonies of ants: the interacting roles of age, environment and task”. KK Ingram, DM Gordon, DA Friedman, M Greene, J Kahler, S Peteru. Also we wrote ant Reviews and Perspective papers 2017, Cell, "The MutAnts are here” (Perspective). DA Friedman, DM Gordon, L Luo, Cell. 2017, Molecular Ecology, “Two lineages that need each other" (Perspective). DM Gordon, DA Friedman. 2016, Annual Reviews Neuroscience, “Ant Genetics: Reproductive Physiology, Worker Morphology, and Behavior”. DA Friedman, DM Gordon. Apart from my dissertation research with Professor Gordon, during grad school I worked on articles in other areas: 2019, ALIUS Bulletin 3, “Dennett Explained”, D Dennett, B Fleig-Goldstein, DA Friedman. 2019, Synthese, “The ant colony as a test for scientific theories of consciousness” DA Friedman & E Søvik. 2018, Arts,"Partner Pen Play in Parallel (PPPiP): A New PPPiParadigm for Relationship Improvement", AV Mikhailova, DA Friedman. 2018, ALIUS Bulletin, “Of woodlice and men: A Bayesian account of cognition, life and consciousness”, K Friston, M Fortier, DA Friedman. 2015, Frontiers in Genetics “Commentary: Portuguese crypto-Jews: the genetic heritage of a complex history” AW Marcus, ER Ebel, DA Friedman.

⁠

Undergraduate Research (2010-2014)

At University of California, Davis, I primarily worked in the

lab of Professor Artyom Kopp⁠

, working on the evolution of sexually dimorphic traits in Drosophila. We were exploring how cis-regulatory elements in the genome (enhancers) could change over evolutionary time to create new gene-gene interactions, and how that process could generate morphological diversity. Working with many species of Drosophila was amazing - the lab had lines of flies collected from all over the world, each with something to teach us. I also worked in the

lab of Professor Brian Johnson⁠

on honey bees. Honey bees undergo a structured transition between tasks as they age, and we were interested in how gene expression in the brain might be involved in these behavioral transitions. Dissecting bee brains is very relaxing, and served as an excellent introduction to behavioral genetics in eusocial insects. The work with bees was published as "

Large-scale coding sequence change underlies the evolution of postdevelopmental novelty in honey bees⁠

" in 2015, and provides some interesting work towards understanding the relationship between gene coding sequence changes and tissue-specific gene expression changes. Publications from Undergraduate research: 2016, Int. J. Radiation Biology, "Influence of Nuclear Structure on the formation of radiation-induced lethal lesions". DA Friedman, L Tait, A Vaughan. 2015, Medical Hypotheses, “Could Ehrlichial Infection Cause Some of the Changes Associated with Leukemia, Myelodysplastic Diseases and Autoimmune Disorders, and Offer Antibiotic Treatment Options?”. CA Kallicka, DA Friedman, MBA Nyindo. 2015, Mol. Bio. and Evolution, "Large Scale Coding Sequence Change Underlies the Evolution of Post-developmental Novelty in Honey Bees". WC Jasper, TA Linksvayer, J Atallah, DA Friedman, JC Chiu, and BR Johnson. .

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