Welcome to the PrimAL Lab! Led by Dr. Kenny Chiou, Assistant Professor in the Department of Biology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, the PrimAL Lab’s research centers on the intersection of sociality, ecology, genomics, and health in primates. We are interested in the biological and evolutionary underpinnings of health and aging, focusing on two main questions:
- how social experiences and other environmental stimuli may influence health disparities by altering physiology, physiology, and aging.
- how genome evolution shaped by population dynamics and natural selection influences physiology and health.
Our research is collaborative and multidisciplinary, blending evolutionary biology, biological anthropology, psychology, neuroscience, geroscience, and genomics. Our research also combines insights from field-based observations, laboratory-based experiments, and computational analysis. Our work therefore takes us along the full gamut from fieldwork to labwork to the computational work necessary for making sense of complex and highly dimensional data.
Our community
Our team is a community, and we expect community members to contribute to a safe, equitable, and welcoming environment. Everyone agrees to:
- maintain a collaborative atmosphere and learn from one another,
- treat one another with respect, combat discrimination, and ensure that people of (including but not limited to) all races, gender identities, national origins, ethnicities, religions, ages, sexual orientations, ability statuses, physical appearances, and socioeconomic statuses feel and are equally welcome and valued, and
- stand up for all in the face of bias, harassment, or discrimination.
We agree to communicate about failures in these commitments, either directly and/or through the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s reporting mechanism.
Frequently asked questions
Where are you located?
We are located in Birmingham, Alabama in the Department of Biology of the University of Alabama at Birmingham. See The Lab for more details.
Are you recruiting?
Yes! We are currently recruiting at all levels, including students, postdocs, and technicians. Visit the Join Us page to get in touch.
I don’t have a formal background in biology. Does that matter?
Probably not! We are a highly integrative lab and welcome perspectives from biology, anthropology, psychology, neuroscience, sociology, computer science, and other fields. A strong sense of curiosity and a willingness to learn are the most valued traits.
I’m looking for the Chiou Lab of Alabama. Is this it?
It depends! Dr. Katie Chiou runs the Ancient People and Plants Laboratory, an archaeology lab at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. Dr. Kenny Chiou runs the PrimAL Lab (this lab), a genomics lab at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Despite Katie and Kenny being sibling anthropologists, there is no formal relationship between the two labs.