Dr. Clifford Fontenot

Instructor of Biological Sciences

Ph.D., University of California, Santa Barbara, 2002

 

Office: 331 Biology Building

Phone:(985) 549-3466

Email:cfontenot@southeastern.edu

Office Hours: by appointment

 

Teaching Expertise:Human Physiology, Anatomy & Physiology lab

Links:Recent Publications

 

Research Interests:

I am generally interested in the behavior, conservation, and evolutionary ecology of amphibians and reptiles. I am currently focused on two main areas:

 

First, is a long-term (2003-present) wetlands snake assemblage study in the Lake Pontchartrain Basin, which produces a massive amount of data on body size, assemblage structure, habitat association, seasonal activity, and road mortality. Here, my interests are in species body size scaling, functional patch size of habitats, the effects of flooding, the effect of roads on mortality, and other general aspects of ecology.

 

Second, is the evolution of vision in snakes. What are the accommodation mechanisms, and how are they distributed phylogenetically? More specifically, how have terrestrial animals that independently evolved eyes in one medium (e.g., air, on land) adapted to the change in refractive index experienced when foraging in another medium (e.g., underwater)?