Ecology & Evolutionary Biology

Home » graduate » Page 6

graduate

Lampley Receives Graduate Research Assistantship

by

Jayne Lampley (Schilling Lab) is one of just 26 graduate students across UT who have received a 2016 Summer Graduate Research Assistantship from The Office of Research and Engagement.  The GRAs are funded by the Scholarly and Research Incentive Funds. Selected faculty projects receive $3,600 in support of student stipends for work completed during the summer.

Her project is called “Analysis of an Evolutionary Radiation in Trillium.”

Congratulations!

NSF DDIG for Van Nuland

by

Michael Van Nuland (Schweitzer Lab) has been awarded a Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant from the National Science Foundation.

The goal of his project is to understand the mechanistic basis of plant genetic-by-soil microbial phylogenetic-by-abiotic environment interactions that will determine plant and soil function across important gradients of global change (e.g., temperature, H2O, and soil nitrogen [N]). The results will provide managers fundamental insights into how plants, as mediated by the diversity of the soil community, respond to abiotic stress and new tools to mitigate environmental change by identifying genotypes with high plant productivity, accelerated phenology, consistent soil conditioning, and positive feedbacks in different environments. Identification of soil microorganisms that influence plant traits, such as signaling the timing of bud break and initiation of the growing season, will be applicable to a wide range of global change issues.

Congratulations, Michael!

Welch Receives ESA’s Graduate Student Policy Award

by

The Ecological Society of America announced the six 2016 recipients of its annual Graduate Student Policy Award, and the list includes our own Jessica Welch (McCracken and Simberloff Labs)!  The award winners will travel to Washington, DC, to participate in policy training sessions and meetings with their US Representative and Senators.  On Capitol Hill, they will team with other scientists to discuss with lawmakers the importance of federal funding for the biological sciences, particularly the National Science Foundation.

To view the full press release, please click here.

Science Article for Borstein

by

Sam Borstein (O’Meara Lab) is a coauthor on a new article in Science called “A pharyngeal jaw evolutionary innovation facilitated extinction in Lake Victoria cichlids.”

This paper looks at how the pharyngeal jaw apparatus in cichlids, widely considered an evolutionary innovation allowing them to feed on a variety of prey items, doomed piscivorous cichlids when the Nile perch invaded Lake Victoria in the 1950’s. The results suggests that competition in conjunction with predation by the introduced Nile perch drove hundreds of endemic cichlid species to extinction.

Congratulations, Sam!

Award for Pfennigwerth

by

Not only did Alix Pfennigwerth (Schweitzer Lab) win a scholarship to support her travel, lodging and registration to attend the Natural Areas Conference, she received an award while she was there!

Pfennigwerth won “best student oral presentation” at the conference in Little Rock, AR, which was held November 3-5.  She presented results from her Master’s work in a talk called, “Inferring response to climate change from natural laboratories: is there convergence in plant functional traits across multiple elevational gradients in Rhododendron maximum?” She discussed how patterns from her field and common garden experiments are relevant to conservation professionals and can be used to inform conservation planning for future natural areas under climate change.

 

Scholarship for Pfennigwerth

by

Alix Pfennigwerth (Schweitzer Lab) was awarded a Natural Areas Association Student Scholarship to fund her travel, lodging and registration to attend the Natural Areas Conference in Little Rock Arkansas, Nov 3-5, 2015.  She will present results from her EEB Master’s work there. Her talk, called “Inferring response to climate change from natural laboratories: is there convergence in plant functional traits across multiple elevational gradients in Rhododendron maximum?” discusses how patterns from her field and common garden experiments are relevant to conservation professionals and can be used to inform conservation planning for future natural areas under climate change. The award is from the Natural Areas Association with donor support from Bureau of Land Management.

EEB: A Great Place for a PhD

by

We keep track of where our PhD students go after they graduate, and we’re proud of what we see!  After five years post-graduation, 57% are tenure-track faculty, and 17% are in government jobs (EPA, etc.).  Others are in non-tenure-track teaching positions, private industry (Wolfram, SAS, etc.), and more.  See the poster for more information.

EEBProgression