How to be social: understanding the mechanisms underpinning complex sociality

This project aims to investigate the mechanisms underlying the formation of complex social systems in vertebrates. We have identified a novel Australian model system with a wide range of sociality for this purpose. This project expects to generate new knowledge on how the social environment interacts with the brain during social organisation and lay the foundation for a major grant application (ARC Discovery). The ultimate end goal of this work is to increase our understanding of how the brain and social environment interact to moderate aggression and enhance social associations.