Research Interests:

I study how genes that originate from ancient whole genome duplications shape plant adaptation and evolution long after lineages have returned to being diploids.

Publications: 

• Qi, Xinshuai, Hong An, Tara E. Hall, Chenlu Di, Paul D. Blischak, Michael TW McKibben, Yue Hao, Gavin C. Conant, J. Chris Pires, and Michael S. Barker. "Genes derived from ancient polyploidy have higher genetic diversity and are associated with domestication in Brassica rapa." New Phytologist 230, no. 1 (2021): 372-386.
• McKibben, Michael TW, and Michael S. Barker. "Applying Machine Learning to Classify the Origins of Gene Duplications." bioRxiv (2021).
• Li, Zheng, Michael TW McKibben, Geoffrey S. Finch, Paul D. Blischak, Brittany L. Sutherland, and Michael S. Barker. "Patterns and processes of diploidization in land plants." Annual Review of Plant Biology 72 (2021): 387-410.
• McKibben, Michael, and Jeremiah A. Henning. "Hemiparasitic plants increase alpine plant richness and evenness but reduce arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal colonization in dominant plant species." PeerJ 6 (2018): e5682.