May 2008

Christina Esposito is elected the 2008 Science Ambassador for the College of Science

Tina is awarded EEB Ambassador of Science distinction and will serve in this capacity until May 2009.

May 2008

John Putz to start graduate school at Indiana University

John, who just received Honorable Mention for his National Science Foundation's Graduate Research Fellowship, has accepted graduate school offer from Indiana University in Bloomington and will start his Ph.D. work there in Fall 2008.

April 2008

Rebecca Young is awarded a Ph.D. and postdoctoral position at Yale

On April 8th, Becca successfully defended her dissertation "Evolution and development of diversity: an example in foraging morphology of shrews". Dr. Rebecca Young will continue her research as a postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at Yale University.

April 2008

Rachael Delaney wins the Honors College research grant

Rachael is awarded a $1,330 research grant to conduct her research project "What are generalists? An empirical comparison of phenotypic, functional, and ecological variation in generalist and specialist populations". The award will be presented at The University Research Grants Ceremony.

April 2008

Rebecca Young receives The 2008 Scholar Award

In a fitting recognition of her accomplishments while at the University of Arizona, Becca is awarded The 2008 Scholar Prize -- established by the University to recognize "exceptional achievements in science and academia by a graduate student". Becca is the first recipient of this most prestigious research award.

March 2008

Laura Stein presents her work at the Honors College Research Conference

Laura presented her work -- "Male provisioning of incubating females in passerine birds: An overlooked component of fitness?" -- at the Research Conference, focusing on life history consequences of sexual selection, particularly in desert systems.

February 2008

Christina Esposito joins the Lab

Tina brings with her an interest in biomedical sciences and evolutionary ecology. Her work in the lab focuses on dissection, preparation, and measurement of muscle tissues of shrews as a part of a comparative study of morphology, ecology, and biomechanics. The overall goal of this work is to understand the origin and evolution of complex traits with substantial environmental sensitivities.

February 2008

Two papers, Two covers

Lab's research is on two covers of major scientific journals this month. Not being able to choose just one, Philosophical Transactions of the Roayl Society puts all four of our photos on its cover to accompany our paper, while our "finches on the moon" photo, which was featured in Nature in 2006, highlights our paper as the current cover of Journal of Evolutionary Biology.

February 2008

Rachael Delaney joins the Lab

In the lab, Rachael works on preparation of tissue samples for RNA extraction and rtPCR to study patterns of gene expression in skeletal tissues of Socirid shrews. The overall goal of this work is to understand the origin and evolution of complex traits with substantial environmental sensitivities.

January 2008

"BirdSnakes "added

A gallery showing the unique and never before photographed behavior of bird-hunting Western diamond-backed snakes is added to the Feature category of TenBestPhotos.com.

January 2008

Anne Storey joins the Lab for a sabbatical stay

Dr. Anne Storey, Professor and Chair of Cognitive and Behavioural Ecology Program at Memorial University in Newfoundland is the Lab's sabbatical visitor for 2008. Anne's work is at the interface of animal physiology and life history, with specific focus on the significance of corticosterone and prolactin variation across ecological and social contexts.

Happy New Year!

In 2007 we travelled to seven different countries - India, Sweden, New Zealand, France, Australia, Canada, United Kingdom - to give thirteen talks (one per four weeks), published twelve papers (one for each month), received four awards (one for each season), got married (once, Becca), published our thirty fifth cover, had our first pro wildlife photo exhibit, and counted the twenty thousandth visitor to the lab's main website on November 18th... Happy 2008!

December 2007

Jerod Merkle to start graduate school at the University of Montana

Having spent his summer disturbing house finches in our recently established Gardiner study site by chasing wolves in nearby Yellowstone, Jerod will now start his graduate work at the University of Montana. So now we won't have to hire expensive winter techs to take care of our finch study populations near UM campus in Missoula...

November 2007

Голубaя сиалия around the world

Insightful and intelligent radio program by Dr Marina Astvatsaturyan "Rapid evolution of behavior facilitated range expansion" on one of the largest stations in Europe features our recent PNAS paper. Coverage also appears in the Academy of Science Newsletter, Science News, and reprinted in usual sources. Upcoming issue of The National Wildlife Magazine publishes a photo report about the study.

October 2007

"Amazing journey "added

A gallery showing the unique behavior of male spotted sandpiper and his brood of one-day old chicks is added to the Feature category of TenBestPhotos.com.

September 2007

Three Papers, Three Covers

Lab and collaborators' research is on three! covers of major scientific journals this month! Becca's paper is featured on the cover of Evolution, Libby's paper is the cover of Intergrative and Comparative Biology, and Renee's paper is the cover of Proceedings of the National Academy of Science of USA.

|Original photo for PNAS cover | Original photo for Evolution cover | Original photo for ICB cover|

July 2007

Mike Sweeney joins the Lab; Alex Badyaev receives "2007 Distinguished Early-Career Teaching Award"; Science News publishes a cover feature on the Lab's work

Mike, a recipient of President's Award for Excellence for four consequtive years, begins his work on ecology and evolution of foraging morphology in shrews, focusing on diet specialization in relation to developmental variation in mandibles. College of Science awards the 2007 Distinguished Early-Career Teaching Award to Alex. And in an expanded report Science News cover article features both Lab's older work on sex-ratio variation as well as newer studies on the mechanisms of sex-determination in birds.

July 2007

"Dragonmasters" added

A gallery documenting never before observed behavior of Sorex shrews in the wild is added to the Feature section of TenBestPhotos.com. The gallery also contains the first-ever photographs of free-living pigmy shrews (S. hoyi) - one of the smallest (2g) mammals in the world.

June 2007

Libby Landeen wins the 2007 "Best Paper Award" of the Cooper Ornithological Society Meeting

Libby received Best Student Paper Award of the Cooper Ornithological Society Annual Meeting in Moscow, Idaho for her presentation on "Developmental evolution of sexual displays: Model and a test of feather growth and pigmentation."

May 2007

Laura Stein receives research grant from Honors College

Laura is awarded $1,400 research grant to conduct her independent study "Male provisioning of incubating females in a passerine bird: An overlooked aspect of fitness?". The award was presented at Undergraduate Research Grants Ceremony.

April 2007

Takashi Kodera to start graduate school at UC-Riverside

Adding to his Master of Science in Computer Science from Osaka University and B.Sc. degree in Ecology from Arizona, Takashi will now begin his doctoral work at the Department of Biology of University of California-Riverside in the fall 2007.

March 2007

Tasha Krecek joins the Lab

Tasha's project in the lab involves study of ontogeny and evolution of biochemical pathways in animal coloration. Tasha is working on her second degree in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and brings with her an expertise in anthropology and classical civilization (and knowledge of ancient Greek and Latin). How about that for a diversity of perspectives...

March 2007

Kevin Oh is 2007 Galileo Circle Scholar!

Kevin is awarded prestigious 2007 Galileo Circle Scholarship of the College of Science in recognition of "truly extraordinary level of accomplishments in research, teaching, and outreach during his four years at the University of Arizona".

This is the second Galileo Award in the lab.

February 2007

University of Arizona's Museum of Natural History pages are up

Web design by Greg C Greene with photography by Alex Badyaev:

Collections home page | Invertebrate Collection | Fish Collection | Amphibian & Reptilian Collection| Bird Collection | Mammal Collection

February 2007

Renee Duckworth is among eight researchers worldwide chosen to present at the Third Annual University of Michigan Young Scientists Symposium

The prestigious symposium is sponsored by the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department at the University of Michigan. Eight outstanding young scientists are selected from a worldwide pool of researchers each year. Renee, now at the Institute of Evolutionary Biology at University of Edinburgh, UK, is invited to present her research on quantitative and population genetics of competitive behaviors.

January 2007