Gaughran Lab

Team

Stephen J. Gaughran

Principal Investigator

Portrait of Stephen J. Gaughran

Originally from New York’s Hudson Valley, Stephen grew up at the meeting point of pristine nature and one of the world’s largest urbanized areas. Inspired by this dichotomy, he decided to study Environmental Biology at Columbia University followed by an MRes at the University of St Andrews. After two years as program manager of the Institute for Comparative Genomics at the American Museum of Natural History, Stephen pursued a Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Yale University, working with Gisella Caccone. In 2021, he joined the labs of Bridgett vonHoldt and Andrea Graham at Princeton University as an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellow.

Stephen joined the Department of Integrative Biology at UC Berkeley as an Assistant Adjunct Professor in 2025. His research at Berkeley focuses on understanding the evolution of adaptive and deleterious variation in natural populations by combining evolutionary genomics, functional genomics, pedigree estimation, and temporal sampling.

Email: sjgaughran[at]berkeley[dot]edu

CV Google Scholar

Current Undergraduate Researchers

Lab Mascot

Ruby sitting beside the water with a green tennis ball

Ruby Gaughran-Gould

Adopted in New Jersey, Ruby is currently working towards her B.A. (Bachelor of Arfs) at the University of California, Bark-eley. Her hobbies include playing fetch, stealing socks, and hiking with Stephen and Colin.

Lab Alumni