| Birth Place: | Jamaica |
| Nationality: | Canadian |
| Fields: | Ecology |
| Workplaces: | University of Toronto at Scarborough |
| Thesis1 Title: | and |
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| Thesis1 Url: | and |
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| Thesis1 Year: | and |
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| Spouse: | Andrew Mason |
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Maydianne Andrade is a Jamaican-born Canadian ecologist. She is known for her work on the mating habits of spiders, in particular spiders belonging to the Latrodectus species.[1] In 2007, she was named a Canadian Research Chair in Integrative Behavioural Ecology.[2]
Andrade was born in Kingston, Jamaica and immigrated with her parents to Vancouver, Canada when she was three years old.[3]
Andrade earned her BSc in 1992 from Simon Fraser University before pursuing a MSc in zoology in 1995 from the University of Toronto at Mississauga. Her MSc thesis was entitled "Mating behavior and constraints on reproductive success in a spider with male sexual sacrifice".[4] Andrade then gained her PhD from Cornell University in 2000 under the co-supervision of Stephen T. Emlen and Paul W. Sherman, investigating "Sexual selection and male mating behavior in a cannibalistic spider."[5]
Andrade is a professor at the University of Toronto Scarborough, whose research explores how the reproductive behaviours of males and females evolve through the interaction of sexual and natural selection in different ecological contexts.[6] Her best known work is about the mating habits of Australian redback spiders where the most successful males often increase the amount of time they spend mating while being cannibalized by female redbacks.[7]
She is the Canada Research Chair in Integrative Behavioural Ecology and is the vice-dean of faculty affairs and equity at the University of Toronto Scarborough.[8] Andrade serves as special adviser to the Dean at the University of Toronto Scarborough.[9] She has published over 75 academic publications, which have been cited over 3,000 times, resulting in a h-index and i10-index of 36 and 51 respectively.[10]
In 2005, Andrade was named one of the Brilliant 10 by Popular Science magazine.[11] She appeared in the second episode of Season 4 of Nova ScienceNow.[12] In 2020 Andrade was featured in and presented an episode of CBC's The Nature of Things with David Suzuki about recent discoveries at the Burgess Shale, called "First Animals",[13] and was interviewed for Quirks & Quarks on her research and work towards racial equity in STEM.[14] She was the 2021 Carleton University's Discovery Lecturer. Andrade also hosts the weekly podcast "The New Normal."
Andrade is the co-founder and president of the Canadian Black Scientists Network, and recently led the group to host a virtual conference, called BE‑STEMM 2022, to highlight Black Canadians in the fields of science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine.[15] [16] [17] Over 1,500 individuals were in attendance. Andrade also co-chairs the Toronto Initiative for Diversity and Excellence, and serves on the Steering Committee for the University of Toronto's Black Research Network.[18] [19]
She works in a lab adjacent to that of her husband, Andrew Mason.