The Life Scientific: Rebecca Kilner
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A fur-stripped mouse carcase might not sound like the cosiest of homes \\u2013 but that is where the burying beetle makes its nest, and where Rebecca Kilner has focused much of her research.
A professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Cambridge, Rebecca\\u2019s work \\u2013 initially with cuckoos, then more recently with beetles \\u2013 has shed invaluable light on the relationship between social behaviours and evolution.
She tells Jim al-Khalili how the beetles' helpfully swift generational churn and mouse-based parenting has allowed her team to study evolution in action, demonstrating for the first time what was previously just evolutionary theory.
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