2023-2024 cohort
Graduate students are fundamental to the research enterprise in EEOB. This year, we welcomed 20 new students into our graduate program. This includes 12 master’s students and 8 doctoral students coming to us from 10 states and 2 countries.
Two new NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program recipients
Troy Bowers and Jesse Wallace received funding from this highly competitive fellowship program in which applicants have about a 16% chance of being selected. Jessie’s research focuses on understanding how the environmental conditions and geography of a region influence invasion success; Troy’s work focuses on the impacts of acoustic environments on cricket behaviors and life history traits.
REU mentoring
Graduate students Hannah Moore (Hood Lab) and Kylee Wilson (Ludsin Lab) mentored two Research Experience for Undergraduates students this summer at the Aquatic Ecology Laboratory in partnership with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources-Division of Wildlife. Jim Hood, Kylee, Stu Ludsin and Hannah are shown below with REU students Olivia Houpt, Marley McLaughlin and Jay Kelly. ODNR biologists Taylor Hunkins and Joe Conroy are also shown.
Undergraduates in research
Graduate student Alexis Wafer’s project in the Hovick Lab investigates the mechanisms of trait-based variation in populations of giant ragweed throughout the U.S. Corn Belt. They have conducted several large-scale experiments in the last three years that required help beyond one graduate student. Alexis has personally recruited 29 undergraduate students (and counting!) to work on this USDA-funded giant ragweed research.
New sea anemone species
Bellactis lux, commonly known as the “Lightbulb anemone,” is a recently described species of sea anemone from the Gulf of Mexico (USA: Florida & Alabama). The common name highlights the distinctive shape and appearance of the tentacles which have a bulbous shape. SCUBA divers and aquaria hobbyists have reported B. lux since the early 1990s. The description of B.lux was led by Alonso Delgado, a PhD candidate in Dr. Meg Daly’s lab, and in collaboration with former Daly lab alum Dr. Paul Larson and Dr. Nancy Sheridan, both currently from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. Bellactis lux (photo below) belongs to the larger sea anemone family Aiptasiidae, a focus of Alonso’s dissertation. He is interested in phylogenetic and venom evolution in this family.
New position
Hannah Moore, who is pursuing her PhD working with Dr. Jim Hood, has begun her job as a Columbia River Fisheries Analyst. Hannah is the primary technical analyst for implementation of Columbia River fisheries and a technical staff member for Compact/Joint state meetings.
