University of Michigan
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

Over the next eight months, about five million specimens from the U-M Museum of Zoology's "wet" collection -- animals preserved in alcohol inside various containers -- will be moved from the Ruthven Museums Building on central campus to a new off-campus storage facility.

“This move is designed to update the placement of all ethanol collections. Basic standards, safety codes for storage of flammable material has changed comprehensively,” said Diarmaid Ó Foighil, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and director and curator of the Museum of Zoology. “The storage facilities of Ruthven no longer meet code. The university has invested very heavily in upgrading this facility on Varsity Drive.”

The new facility at Varsity Drive, adjoining the U-M Herbarium, has been designed and built to safely store and protect the collection. The budget for the project, which includes building the new storage facility, moving the collection and other selected renovations, is $20 million.

View a video produced by the U-M News Service, which was featured on the U-M Gateway and is currently on the News Service home page.

Edward G. Voss, professor emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Michigan, curator emeritus of vascular plants at the University Herbarium, and a legendary teacher at the U-M Biological Station, died on Monday, Feb. 13, 2012, just three days before the release of his latest book. On February 16, the University of Michigan Press released Field Manual of Michigan Flora, co-authored by Voss and Dr. Anton A. Reznicek, curator of vascular plants at the University Herbarium.  According to the publisher, the new Flora is the most up-to-date guide available for all seed plants growing wild in Michigan.

With a distinguished career in both natural history and systematic botany, Voss is a nationally recognized scholar, teacher and regional leader in conservation, according to an article on Denison University’s website. His monumental three-volume work, Michigan Flora, was the culmination of 40 years of collecting, identifying and describing more than 2,500 seed-bearing plants native to Michigan. The three volumes, published in 1972, 1985 and 1997, respectively, include descriptions, illustrations, taxonomic keys, color plates of Voss's photographs and 2,465 maps of documented distributions for all known seed plants in the state. The volumes proved essential to environmental consultants, persons responsible for threatened and endangered species, wildflower enthusiasts, photographers and environmental lawyers and have enabled intelligent amateurs as well as botanists to identify any flowering plant in Michigan. The first volume of Michigan Flora was honored by a Resolution of the Michigan Senate in 1972; the second volume received the H.A. Gleason Award of the New York Botanical Garden in 1986. The new Field Manual of Michigan Flora expands and updates the first three volumes.

These books represent a significant contribution to the Michigan historical literature. Voss’ role as the leading authority on a large flora came about during an era of growing awareness and interest in threatened biological diversity.

Born in Delaware, Ohio, in 1929, Voss spent his childhood in Toledo. His early interest in plants and insects began at his family's cottage in Mackinaw City, Mich., where he spent summers collecting caterpillars, moths, butterflies and plants. After earning a bachelor's degree in biology with honors from Denison University in 1950, Voss continued his education at the University of Michigan where he earned a master's degree in biology in 1951 and a Ph.D. in botany in 1954. He had homes in Ann Arbor and Mackinaw City, Mich.

He joined U-M in 1956 as a research associate at the Herbarium and was appointed assistant professor in 1960, promoted to associate professor in 1963 and professor of botany in 1969. Many of his former students have gone on to distinguished academic careers of their own, including directorships of several herbariums and the chair of botany at the Academy of Natural Sciences.

Voss served as curator of vascular plants from 1961 until his retirement in 1996. He spent 55 summers teaching at the University of Michigan Biological Station at Douglas Lake introducing generations of biologists from all over the country to field botany where they absorbed his encyclopedic knowledge even as they sank into the bogs, swatted the
mosquitoes, and groaned at his puns. Voss took Botany at the UMBS in 1949 as a senior (he got an A+) and was there ever since, as a teaching assistant, an investigator, and a teacher through 2008. Voss’ scientific interests include entomology and he has published several studies of moths.

After being awarded emeritus status from the University of Michigan in 1996, Voss kept an office at the Herbarium and remained active. He gave illustrated lectures on botanical history and/or plants of the Great Lakes Region to both professional and nonprofessional groups and led field trips for such groups as the Little Traverse Conservancy and the Michigan Botanical Club, which bestowed a lifetime achievement award on him.

Voss's focus of research was the vascular plants of the Great Lakes region: their taxonomy, identification, phytogeography, postglacial history, and status in natural environments—with special interest in boreal plants generally and in aquatic plants. He was also interested in the history of biology (especially the early exploration in the Great Lakes region) and in Lepidoptera of the northern Great Lakes area.

“There are enough Ed Voss accomplishments to fill a book,” wrote Jim McCormac, a biologist with the Ohio Division of Wildlife, who considered Voss a mentor. “But all of that aside, what Ed did throughout his career that was at least of equal importance to his academic work was his encouragement of others,” he continued in a blog post about Voss. “For years, other budding young botanists and I would make annual pilgrimages to Ann Arbor to visit Ed and his colleague Tony Reznicek. We would come bearing sheets and sheets of ‘mystery’ plants -- specimens that try as we might, we could not satisfactorily attach a name to. Ed would always, with great patience and never a trace of condescension, work us through our mysteries until a name was arrived at. Those of us who made these journeys to The Man, learned not only a great deal about identifying plants, but also how to encourage students.”

“Gary (Williams) said many times that Ed Voss was by far the best teacher he had ever had,” wrote Gussie Williams, his widow. Williams was a student of Voss’, a teaching assistant and a long-time friend. “Gary had many teachers and as a department chairman evaluated many teachers. He admired Ed's preparation for classes whether it was a field trip or a lecture; his enthusiasm for what he was teaching even though he may have taught the same lesson or seen the same plants hundreds of times; his knowledge of plants and butterflies.”

The new Field Manual of Michigan Flora by Voss and Reznicek significantly expands and updates the three-volume Michigan Flora by incorporating the discoveries of numerous additional species, recent systematic research, and a vast trove of new information on the shifting distributions of Michigan species. It presents concise identification keys, information about habitats, and completely updated distribution maps for all the seed plants, native or naturalized, that have been recorded from the state, fully treating over 2,700 species. All non-native species are included with notes on their first discovery in the state and comments on invasive tendencies. Rare native species that appear to be declining or to have shrinking ranges are also noted. This book is an essential reference for anyone interested in appreciating Michigan's natural heritage and understanding our ever-changing environment.

Field Manual of Michigan Flora can be ordered at the University of Michigan Press. 

“It was a labor of love for me to prepare the Dr. Voss tribute video,” wrote Mary Crum Scholtens. “While you watch the slideshow, you may develop the sense that it is not just a love letter to Dr. Voss, but to the Biological Station, and the natural world, and..... that is how Ed would have wanted it.”

In the Rocky Mountains, archaeologists uncover a unique fossil site packed with astonishingly well-preserved bones of mammoths, mastodons, and other giant extinct beasts. The discovery opens a highly focused window on the vanished world of the Ice Age in North America.

In the episode, Professor Dan Fisher wonders if liquefaction could explain how all these mastodons died. Liquefaction is an earthquake phenomenon that can happen when earthquakes hit an area where the water table is high, it mixes solid ground with water and creates a kind of quicksand into which even entire buildings can sink.

“What we in fact have at Snowmass is something that looks more like a snapshot of a living population,” he said. “It really looks like what you would get if you took a whole family unit and just flipped the switch on them all at the same time.” The episode aired February 1, 2012 but you can watch the entire program on the PBS website.

PBS Newshour summary

Professor L. Lacey Knowles is president-elect of the Society of Systematic Biologists. Her term began January 1, 2012.

“Dr. Knowles has been a pioneer in the integration of theoretical population genetics into phylogenetics,” said Dr. Jack Sullivan, president, Society of Systematic Biologists, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Idaho. “Her election to the presidential seat of SSB reflects that her international peers recognize the excellence and far-reaching consequences of her research.

“In 2013, as the sitting president, she will be both the public face of and provide the main guiding vision for the SSB. In 2014, as the most recent past president, she will organize the Executive Council and give the Presidential Address at the joint annual meetings of the American Society of Naturalists, the Society for the Study of Evolution, and the Society of Systematic Biologists. All three years, she will serve on the Executive Council of the SSB and the Joint Council of all three societies mentioned above.”

The objective of the SSB is the advancement of the science of systematic biology in all its aspects of theory, principles, methodology, and practice, for both living and fossil organisms, with emphasis on areas of common interest to all systematic biologists regardless of individual specialization.

EEB is delighted to announce that Professor and Chair Deborah Goldberg is one of the 2012 winners of the prestigious Sarah Goddard Power Award from the U-M Academic Women's Caucus. Goldberg is an internationally recognized scientist in plant ecology. She has published two books and more than 70 papers in peer-reviewed journals. She is particularly well known for her studies of plant community dynamics, structure and function.

The award will be presented to Goldberg at a ceremony at 4 p.m., Wednesday, February 15, 2012 at the Michigan League. The award was established in memory of Sarah Goddard Power, a former regent who was a strong advocate for women within the University of Michigan. She was inducted into the Michigan Hall of Fame in 1988 for her civil rights accomplishments. The award honors faculty and senior administrative staff who have made significant contributions to the betterment of women at U-M and globally through distinguished leadership, scholarship or other activities related to their professions.

Dr. Radka Wildova, one of Goldberg’s former postdoctoral fellows, who is currently a visiting scientist, Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies, states in a supporting letter, “Her impact has been so widespread that it is now almost impossible to find a scholarly paper on plant competition that does not reference the approach that she pioneered."

As further noted by Wildova, “Deborah has been tireless and enthusiastic in her effort to encourage young female scientists and graduate students to pursue their dream careers.”

Betsy Foxman, Hunein F. and Hilda Maassab Professor of Epidemiology, wrote in her letter of nomination, “Scientific achievements aside, Dr. Goldberg takes advantage of every opportunity to use her scientific stature to increase opportunities for women scientists in her department, at Michigan, and worldwide. During her tenure as chair of EEB, the proportion of women faculty has increased from 17 to 27 percent. Harder to tabulate is the influence of Dr. Goldberg’s attention to issues of gender and ethnic diversity during her service on various committees and boards.”

According to Foxman’s letter, Goldberg's remarkable commitment to service is evident in over two pages of her curriculum vitae filled with the names of editorial boards, and international, national, university and departmental committees. Most notable is the Ecological Society of America, where she has served continuously in some capacity since 1985 (currently as vice president for science) as well as serving on the editorial boards of eight of the most prestigious journals in ecology.

“To put it succinctly: Dr. Goldberg makes things happen,” Foxman continued. “She acted as interim chair of EEB during the difficult separation of biology into two departments, then again as interim following the short service of an externally appointed chair, and was ultimately appointed as chair. As chair, Dr. Goldberg transformed the department culture to one that celebrates diversity, collegiality, and collaboration.”

Goldberg established a standing departmental committee on diversity, and was instrumental in establishing the Frontiers Master’s Program in EEB, which is designed to attract students from nontraditional backgrounds into biology and prepare them for top-ranked Ph.D. programs. She served as a member of the Presidential Advisory Commission on Women’s Issues at U-M for four years, and during that time, helped promote the issue of parental leave for graduate students who are new parents. Goldberg is a current member of STRIDE, a committee that provides information and advice about practices that will maximize the likelihood that diverse, well-qualified candidates for faculty positions will be identified, and, if selected for offers, recruited, retained, and promoted at U-M.

“Dr. Goldberg is a devoted mentor. She not only models how to balance being a successful scientist, department chair, faculty member, and mother, but also spends countless hours helping others who are trying to do so.”

As noted by George W. Kling, Robert G. Wetzel Professor, Goldberg helps women in science with “dedication, energy, and fervor.”

As one of the first women at U-M to chair a science department, Goldberg reaches out to other women faculty, offering advice and counsel based on her experiences. Nancy Love, associate dean for academic programs and initiatives at Rackham and former department chair in civil and environmental engineering, wrote, “Dr. Goldberg has served as a useful sounding board, a source of sage advice, and one who has helped connect me with possible research collaborators as I have worked to get my research program off the ground at U-M while learning the ropes as department chair."

Pamela Raymond, Stephen S. Easter Collegiate Professor and chair of the Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, wrote, “I would have had a much more difficult time surviving my first year as chair without her wise counsel and support."

The Academic Women's Caucus was founded in 1975 when a group of academic women gathered to exchange information and investigate and resolve problems that academic women were facing. This dynamic group works to promote women in the academy through programming, networking and the presentation of the Sarah Goddard Power Award.

The Academic Women's Caucus continues to focus on many of the same tenure and salary equity issues it did in 1975. This committed group of women from diverse academic backgrounds continues to support all academic women, junior and senior alike, to help them develop and achieve their goals.

Dr. Marc Ammerlaan has been selected as one of three inaugural Collegiate Lecturers at U-M’s Ann Arbor campus, for his achievements and many contributions to the education of U-M students.

In recognition of his accomplishments, Ammerlaan will receive $2,000 for each of the first two years and will be given the honorary title "Collegiate Lecturer." Ammerlaan will be recognized at a reception (to be announced) commemorating the inaugural year of the Collegiate Lecturer program.

Ammerlaan was nominated by his two department chairs and six faculty members who work with him. The Provost selected awardees to recognize U-M lecturers who have demonstrated a sustained record of excellence in teaching, learning and service or other contributions to the University.

“I was surprised and honored to be recognized by the university in this way,” said Ammerlaan. “Even moreso when I found out how many people were involved in the nomination process. Working with students is the most rewarding part of my job. I like to ask them questions and prod them to think their way to the answers. The dedicated staff and enthusiastic GSIs we have here make sure that our intro courses are challenging. This philosophy derives from some of the outstanding faculty I encountered in my first years here. Professor Hiroshi Ikuma in particular, expounded on designing lab exercises so they were open-ended and didn't always give predictable results. It is a small measure of gratitude to be able to name this award after him.”

Ammerlaan joined the Department of Biology in 1995 and is now a lecturer for the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and the Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology. “He has always been, and continues to be an active, valued and integral participant in the Program in Biology’s undergraduate educational mission as developed by both departments,” wrote Professors and Chairs Deborah Goldberg, EEB, and Pamela Raymond, MCDB.

“He is engaged with the student body, and with individual courses, on a number of different levels,” they continued. “The most influential courses in the biological sciences in LSA are the Introductory Biology sequence for science majors (Bio 171, 172, 173), with a combined average enrollment of almost 4,200 undergraduate students per year over the past three years. In 2007, Introductory Biology was completely reorganized by converting the one-term course (Bio 162) into three new courses Bio 171 (EEB), Bio 172 (MCDB), and Bio 173 (Biology Lab). Dr. Ammerlaan was a key member of the committee that planned this major curricular change, and he designed and has subsequently taught the Introductory Biology Laboratory course. He is also responsible for developing and teaching the laboratory sections in Bio 207 Microbiology.”

“The consistent success of the laboratory portion of Bio 207 and the very positive comments made about it by students over the years are due, I believe, essentially wholly to Dr. Ammerlaan’s skill, guidance and dedication,” wrote Professor Paul Dunlap, EEB.

“The new lab exercises that he (and Dr. Jo Kurdziel) developed for the current introductory biology lab are more project-based, and represent a sound and challenging lab course,” wrote Professor Laura Olsen, director of the Program in Biology.

“Marc does everything from write and design the lab experiments and lab practical exams to digging in the mud from the banks of the Huron River, in the dead of winter, to gather enough mud for each group of students,” wrote Professors Kenneth Cadigan and Lyle Simmons, MCDB.

He supervises a large cadre of graduate student instructors and more recently, he has incorporated undergraduate teaching assistants into Bio 173. “He is strongly committed to mentoring both GSI and UTA students and plays a major role in helping them to develop teaching skills and pedagogy,” wrote Goldberg and Raymond. His “exceptional mentoring skills are widely recognized, and he is often paired with new professors or lecturers during their first term of teaching to provide guidance and administrative help.”

Ammerlaan was selected as a Teagle Foundation Fellow in 2009-10 to examine the way students learn, funded by a grant through the U-M Center for Research and Learning on Teaching. He also won the LSA Excellence in Education Award in 1997.

“One has only to talk with Dr. Ammerlaan for a few minutes to appreciate his deep passion for teaching. When Marc lectures, he does a fantastic job! Marc has a great sense for how to explain and present complex information in a way that makes it accessible to sophomore level students,” Cadigan and Simmon’s letter states.

“Speaking as a former associate chair, my job was made much easier by Dr. Ammerlaan’s breadth of knowledge and flexibility,” wrote Cadigan.

Ammerlaan volunteers his time to supervising a team of students participating in the International Genetically Engineered Machine competition. “This process greatly enriches the experience of participating undergraduates far beyond the classroom and stimulates some of them to pursue research-oriented careers,” wrote Professor Xiaoxia Lin, professor of chemical engineering. “For the 2011 competition season, Marc stepped up as the team’s main faculty advisor. Their work earned a bronze medal at America’s Regional Competition in Indianapolis in October. I have been very impressed by his extraordinary enthusiasm and responsibility for undergraduate education.”

“Marc can quickly assess where students will have difficulties as he covers complicated material, and he is proactive about preventing confusion,” wrote Dr. Lynn Carpenter, a lecturer in EEB and MCDB. “Despite all of Marc’s teaching commitments, he finds time to provide service to the university through an active role in the Lecturer’s Employee Organization. He truly has the pulse of the lecturers at the university and he does his best to make sure they are being treated and compensated fairly. It has become obvious that he is a true example of teaching at its finest and a shining star among lecturers. I cannot think of anyone who is more deserving of the title “Collegiate Lecturer.” It is also fitting that he should be in the first cohort to receive this honor.”

EEB graduate student Jasmine Crumsey joined nearly 30 other scientists from across the country in Washington, D.C. this week to brief congressional staff members about climate change research.

Crumsey, who works at the U-M Biological Station, was one of 29 scientists who participated in Wednesday's second annual Climate Science Day on Capitol Hill. This year's event was sponsored by 13 scientific societies and organizations.

The goals were to expose members of Congress and their staffs to accurate climate science from a variety of experts, to highlight relevant impacts of climate change, and to establish working relationships with the congressional offices.

In addition to studying terrestrial ecology and biochemistry at EEB, Crumsey is pursuing a graduate certificate in science technology and public policy at the U-M Ford School of Public Policy. In the Ford program, students learn, among other things, to analyze the role of science and technology in policymaking.

Crumsey said Climate Science Day provided a unique opportunity to extend what she's learned and to gain valuable new skills in communicating with policymakers.

"Communicating the impacts of large-scale environmental changes on natural resources and the complex interactions within ecosystems is relevant to my training as an ecologist, as well as my desire to remain active in science policy throughout my professional career," she said.

On Wednesday, Crumsey and a scientist from Purdue University met with staffers in the offices of seven Michigan and Indiana lawmakers, including Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich.; Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich.; and Rep. Dan Benishek, R-Mich.

"It went really well," she said Thursday. "They were gracious and welcoming."

"We talked to them about the impacts of climate change that we expect to see at the state, regional and national level," Crumsey said. "For the Midwest, climate scientists expect to see increases in the frequency and intensity of severe weather events, including more frequent heat waves and more intense rains.

"For agriculture in the region, one prediction is an increase in pests due to increased winter survival resulting from warmer winters. For the Great Lakes in particular, climate scientists expect to see decreases in water levels and decreases in winter ice cover."

For Climate Science Day, each of the sponsoring organizations—which included the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Chemical Society and the American Geophysical Union—selected several scientists. Crumsey was picked by the National Ecological Observatory Network, known as NEON.

About 100 visits were made to the offices of members of Congress and to some committee staff members during Wednesday's event, said Joanne Padron Carney, director of the Office of Government Relations at the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

"At the end of the day, our goal was really to establish relationships," Carney said. "And if policymakers and their staff members contact these scientists with questions—I've read this research or I saw this opinion, can you give me information, can you explain this to me—then I think that is a success," Carney said.

U-M News Service press release

U-M Gateway

Over 50 people attended the first EEB undergraduate mixer, January 18, 2012, hosted by the EEB Undergraduate Affairs Committee and the Program in Biology. EEB concentrators and minors and those interested in becoming one, met with each other, EEB graduate students and faculty.

They learned more about research opportunities, careers and graduate school, while enjoying pizza and hot cocoa in the graduate student lounge of the Kraus Natural Science Building.  A second mixer is being planned for later in the semester.

Images (from top):

Left to right: EEB graduate student Alex Taylor, Professor Paul Webb, undergraduate Reid Osborn, Dr. Marc Ammerlaan.

Professor Phil Myers talks with EEB senior, Kelly McClure, and recent EEB graduate, Michael Schmidtke.

Professor Paul Webb and Reid Osborn.

EEB is pleased to welcome new assistant professors Vincent Denef and Stephen Smith to the department, along with Melissa Beth Duhaime, research scientist.

Professor Denef hails from the University of California, Berkeley where he was a postdoctoral researcher. His primary research interests are freshwater microbial evolutionary ecology, and community and population genomics.

“It is a particularly exciting time to join U-M as a microbial ecologist, since the university has increased its focus on the microbial world through a series of junior hires across campus in the last few years,” said Denef. “While microbial ecology, which has recently found its second breath through a series of technological and conceptual breakthroughs, has traditionally found its home in microbiology departments, the maturation of this field makes it a perfect time to increase the focus of EEB departments in this field. Exploring how ecological and evolutionary theory as it has been developed for plants and animals applies to the microbial world is a fascinating challenge that I look forward to take on with students.”

Professor Smith joins EEB from Brown University, where he was an iPlant Postdoctoral Researcher. His research interests are in phylogenetics, computational evolutionary biology, biogeography, and phyloinformatics.

Smith primarily tackles questions about evolution at a broad scale with the tree of life and especially in plants. "Constructing and analyzing the tree of life is an enormous challenge, and I develop methods for doing this at large scales, taking advantage of the ongoing revolution in data collection. Although these trees are relevant to any number of questions, I look at how we can use these data to better understand things like the rates of evolution and the geographic history of organisms." Smith currently develops a number of different scientific software packages to do this. He was named a “Scientist to Watch” in the magazine The Scientist, March 2010, in which he was dubbed "The Botanist Hacker" because of his incredible computing skills and ability to pull things together to use in new ways.

Dr. Duhaime studies marine viral community genomics and virus-host model systems, where she is particularly interested in better understanding host range determinants and the role of viruses in defining the genomic "mobilome” of the microbial hosts they infect. Duhaime is also looking at plastic-microbe associations in aquatic systems, interested in connections between microbial community composition and plastic polymer or organic pollutant type. She joins the department from a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Arizona, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology where she studied marine virus genomics with Dr. Matthew Sullivan. Her mentor is Professor Gregory Dick, an assistant professor in U-M’s Departments of Earth and Environmental Science and EEB.

Denef and Smith are currently seeking students to work in their labs. Undergraduate students interested in a summer project can contact Duhaime.

A new University of Michigan computer model of disease transmission in space and time can predict cholera outbreaks in Bangladesh up to 11 months in advance, providing an early warning system that could help public health officials there.

Watch for an EEB research feature coming soon about the paper by Professors Aaron King and Mercedes Pascual. U-M News Service press release.

Image: Dhaka, Bangladesh. Image courtesy of Flickr.com user eGuide Travel