Olivier CHAUVEAU

 last updated 18/11/2022 -   +33 (0)1 69 15 77 20
 olivier.chauveau@universite-paris-saclay.fr
 Diversité et évolution des plantes
 CNRS, Ingénieur de recherche
 publications - orcid 

Research interests

I am a botanist and my research interests concentrate on questions of evolution and more specifically, on how interactions could shape biodiversity. I use a broad range of approaches including systematics, taxonomy, macro- and micromorphology, phylogenetic reconstruction, and biogeography.

A key focus of my current and future research is related to plant-pollinator interactions, which are key components of the dynamics of most terrestrial ecosystems. Since species interactions are considered to play a central role in many speciation events, studying the evolutionary history of traits closely linked to this kind of interaction contributes to improve our knowledge of the mechanisms involved. Insects are the largest group of animals visiting flowers to collect mostly pollen and/or nectar, but some insects seek other resources. Relationships between oil-secreting flowers and specialized oil-collecting bees constitute an example of a close and uncommon interaction. Flowers offering oil as a resource are found in only 11 families distributed across the angiosperms among unrelated orders, including Iridaceae where oil rewards evolved multiple times.

The goal of my research is to improve our knowledge about the evolutionary history of this uncommon pollination system and to test whether the evolution of this uncommon pollination system is a causal factor of diversification among Iridaceae from the Neotropics. Laboratoire Ecologie, Systématique et Evolution

Career path

Since 2018 Research engineer – ESE – Université Paris-Sud 2012-2018 Post-Doc. Biosciences Institute – UFRGS (RS, Brazil) 2012 PhD – Université Paris-Sud. Supervision: Pr. S. Nadot 2007-2012 Research engineer – ESE – Université Paris-Sud 2001-2007 Research engineer – Botanic Garden – Université Paris-Sud 1992-2001 Landscape designer 1992 Master’s degree in horticultural engineering – ENSH Versailles