Mark Fishbein

Dr. Mark Fishbein is plant systematist and evolutionary biologist with expertise in plant identification, phylogenetics, genomics, biogeography, evolution, and ecology. He is director of the OSU Herbarium, a natural history collection of over 160,000 plant specimens. The OSU herbarium is a resource for research, teaching, and outreach to the citizens of Oklahoma regarding the amazing diversity of plant species and vegetation in the state and across the U.S. His research speciality is the evolution and classification of milkweeds, a group of 400 species of mostly herbaceous plants that inhabit grasslands, forests, and deserts in North and South America and Africa.

Research Interests:

The Fishbein lab uses knowledge about the evolutionary history of plants to understand the distribution of species, the interactions of plants and animals, the processes of speciation and hybridization, and the causes and consequences of rarity and weediness. Using primarily the model system of the American milkweeds and large genomic data sets, lab members have reconstructed the evolutionary history of milkweeds. These studies set the stage for investigations of how attack by insect herbivores has shaped the evolution of plant defenses, such as hairiness, latex exudation, and toxic chemicals known as cardiac glycosides. By combining field studies, laboratory analyses, statistical modeling, and analysis of large datasets, lab members are striving to gain a holistic understanding of the factors that influence the generation of plant biodiversity.