Ecology & Evolutionary Biology

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Roche, Botanist in Action

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Graduate student Morgan Roche (Kalisz Lab) is one of Phipps Conservatory’s six current Botany in Action fellows.   The fellows recently visited Phipps, in Pittsburgh, PA, for the Botany in Action program’s annual Science Engagement Week, which featured a series of diverse workshops to enhance the fellows’ scientific communication skills. The fellows explored different ways to communicate their research with those outside of their immediate fields—which included sharing their research with middle school and high school students on the very first day of their workshop!

Read more on the Phipps blog.

NSF S-STEM Grant for Schussler

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Beth Schussler is co-PI on a $2,887,974 collaborative NSF S-STEM grant, which will provide scholarships and research opportunities for four cohorts of STEM-focused students from rural Appalachia to attend UT, Knoxville, or UT, Chattanooga. Beth will be working with PI Erin Hardin (Psychology), and co-PIs Melinda Gibbons, Marisa Moazen, and Denise Gardner, to provide students with research opportunities and cohort-building support programs to increase their success rate in STEM.

Simberloff in Wired and Slate

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Prof. Dan Simberloff appeared in articles in both Wired and Slate in August.

Wired featured Simberloff in a story about human control over species population size.  Tennessee Today also posted a synopsis of Simberloff’s contributions to the article.

Slate featured Simberloff in a debate about whether biocontrol is a better alternative to pesticides. Tennessee Today summarized Simberloff’s contributions to the article.

 

EEB is Hiring

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EEB will be hiring a tenure track faculty member at the Assistant Professor level in the field of Ecosystem Ecology.  Application review will begin October 10, 2016, with a position start date of August 2017.  View the full job advertisement here.

No EEB Seminar Sep. 2

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There will be no EEB Seminar this Friday (Sep. 2). The scheduled speaker (David Frank, from our own EEB & Philosophy departments) will present instead on Friday, Sep. 23. It may take a few days for the central campus events calendar to reflect the change.

Fall 2016 Seminar Series

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The first speaker in EEB’s Fall 2016 Seminar Series will be Sara Branco from the Université de Paris-Sud, on Friday, August 26 at 3:30 p.m. in 307 SERF.  The full schedule has been posted on the EEB website.  The site will be updated with titles and abstracts as they are received.

It may take a week before seminars start appearing in the “Upcoming Events” feed on the EEB homepage, but that will happen, too.

Scientific American Blog Highlights UT Research

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The popular Scientific American Blog has posted an article about bat research done by grad student Jessica Welch (McCracken and Simberloff labs) and NIMBioS postdoc Jeremy Beaulieu.

The article, “Are Bats Facing a Hidden Extinction Crisis? A new way of calculating bat extinction risk reveals previously hidden conservation priorities,” can be viewed here.

Tennessee Today also did an article covering the blog post.

Eppley Foundation Grant Awarded for Hemlock Woolly Adelgid Research

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Professor Daniel Simberloff and postdoc Christy Leppanen have been awarded a $16,500 grant from The Eppley Foundation for Research for their proposal:  Effects of Evolutionary Ecology and Ecosystem Variability in Native and Introduced Predator-Prey Systems.

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Simberloff and Leppanen study interactions involving introduced predators and their prey, the hemlock woolly adelgid, Adelges tsugae, or HWA.  A sap-feeding insect native to Asia, HWA has spread to eastern North America where infestations have caused sharp declines in native hemlocks, including in some locations complete losses of eastern hemlock and Carolina hemlock, which is now vulnerable to extinction.  Predators transplanted from Asia are considered a long-term solution.  Little is known, however, about HWA and predator behavior and interactions in their native or introduced ranges.

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Funds from the Eppley Foundation will be used to study HWA where it is introduced and native, where trees seem relatively unharmed by the insect.  Hemlock species, climate, and invertebrate communities differ between native and invaded areas.  Simberloff and Leppanen are interested in understanding what influences HWA population size, for example, whether predators experience different levels of success in their native and introduced habitats, much like HWA imparts different levels of damage where it is native and introduced.  They suspect that HWA control likely involves a variety of influences and interactions that vary by location.  In their research, they will evaluate interactions involving HWA, its predators, and other native and non-native species in different locations.  For example, they have documented and will assess the significance of predator entrapment in droplets of HWA’s liquid waste, a previously unreported phenomenon that may influence predator success and thus HWA populations; and, if the outcome of entrapment differs by predator species, HWA populations may differ further where predator communities differ.  They will also consider interactions among mites, lichen, and another invasive predator, the multicolored Asian lady beetle, Harmonia axyridis, which shares its native range with HWA.

The results of this research will be included in a review of what is known about evolutionary ecology and ecosystem variability in native and non-native HWA systems relevant to its population size and impacts.  This is a model system with broad applicability in education; information from the review will also be used to develop a teaching lesson.

The Eppley Foundation for Research was incorporated in 1947 for the purpose of “increasing knowledge in pure or applied science…in chemistry, physics and biology through study, research and publication.”  The Foundation funds projects in biological and physical sciences. Particular areas of interest include innovative medical investigations, endangered species and ecosystems in the U.S. and abroad, and climate change.

 – From The Eppley Foundation for Research website