University of Michigan
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

Liz Wason is the 2011 recipient of the Helen Olsen Brower Memorial Fellowship in Environmental Studies from EEB, awarded annually to a graduate student working in applied sciences for the conservation of natural resources.

Wason’s research focuses on plant-insect interactions and plant defenses against herbivores. “The work has implications for biocontrol efforts in agricultural systems,” she said. “The control of pests by manipulating the defenses against herbivores used naturally by plants may be a viable substitute for synthetic pesticides.”

The prestigious award provides one semester of fellowship funding for stipend, tuition and benefits. Sally and Caspar Offutt, Jr., endowed this fellowship in tribute to Sally's mother who graduated in biology in 1917 from the University of Michigan. Brower led a vigorous public life touching on wide-ranging endeavors from politics to war relief. She invariably found her greatest satisfaction with projects involving the outdoors.

The 2010 Brower fellow was John Marino, who studies the interactive effects of parasitism and predation on amphibian populations. Read more about Marino’s research in the previous news item on his NSF DDIG award.

EEB graduate students Jasmine Crumsey and John Marino have won Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grants from the National Science Foundation. The approximately $15,000 awards are for two years. 

Crumsey will examine how interactions among different earthworm species will affect carbon storage. This project will answer unresolved questions regarding changes in forest carbon storage in response to invasions involving multiple earthworm species. As stated in Crumsey's abstract, “this research will have important implications for assessments of exotic earthworm invasion impacts on forest carbon balances in temperate regions. Further, results will improve our understanding of biological invasions on temperate forests and their impacts on forest environmental, economic, and cultural values. The project also has an important international collaboration component that involves researchers in France, where these worms invaded forests long ago. Outcomes will have implications for science policy. For example, there are no current restrictions on the importation of exotic earthworm species to the U.S., nor is there current legislation designed to limit their further spread.”

Marino researches the effects of predators and parasites on larval amphibian communities. He will examine how differences among species in susceptibility to these natural enemies can affect community structure and composition. "Recent studies suggest that these parasites are increasing in abundance in areas near human activities such as agriculture and urbanization," he explained. "In order to understand the implications of this increased abundance, it is necessary to consider not only the direct effects of these parasites, but also how they interact with other prevalent stressors of amphibian populations, such as predators. My research will provide key insights into the mechanisms through which disease and predation jointly impact wildlife populations. These insights will be valuable to plan for the conservation of species that are exposed to a combination of threats." 

The National Science Foundation awards DDIGs in selected areas of the biological sciences. These grants provide partial support of doctoral dissertation research to improve the overall quality of research. 

Susanna Messinger is the recipient of the Margaret Ayers Host Award for Rackham graduate students. The $5,000 award is for spring and summer support and research and is given to graduate students who excel as scholars and show promise of future contributions in their field and community.

Messinger’s current dissertation research seeks to unravel the evolutionary effects of spatial structure on species interactions. “I focus on the theory of spatial effects on predator evolution, specifically pathogens and true predators,” she said. 

“Overall, in addition to improving our understanding of the structure and composition of complex communities, this research has implications for understanding emerging infectious diseases. Thus, the potential applied benefits of this research range from improved conservation and preservation of precious ecological resources to better control of human disease and agricultural pests.”

Host received a Rackham degree in 1942 and went on to study at the University of Oxford. As an alumna, she served U-M in many capacities. After her death in 1987, the Margaret Ayers Host endowment was established to honor her memory and her remarkable contributions as a scholar and to the U-M community and to support women graduate students in perpetuity.

EEB Ph.D. student John Guittar, and incoming Ph.D. students Jordan Bemmels and Katherine Crocker are recipients of National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships. They receive $30,000 a year for three years and an additional $10,500 annually for healthcare and tuition.

Bemmels hopes to study the genomic basis of local adaptation in drought tolerance in populations of a tropical tree species, along a precipitation gradient in Panama.  This work will provide insight into the evolutionary biology of drought adaptation, as well as have implications for predicting how populations may respond to changing climates. Bemmels has elected to put his funding on reserve status during 2011-2012.

Katherine Crocker will be doing behavioral ecology research with Professor Elizabeth Tibbetts, and she anticipates working with chemical communication in Hymenoptera, one of the largest orders of insects comprising wasps, bees, ants and sawflies.

Guittar will investigate the origins and evolution of Pouteria, a taxonomically confusing genus of trees with a high relative abundance in many tropical forests. Read more about Guittar’s research in the following news item. Pictured (left to right): Jordan Bemmels, Katherine Crocker, John Guittar.

Cindy Bick, Frontiers master’s student and John Guittar, Ph.D. student, are winners of U-M’s International Institute Individual Fellowships. They will each receive $4,000 to help support their research abroad.

Cindy Bick will conduct research this summer at the Zoological Society of London. Bick will be gathering demographic data from their captive Tahitian tree snail populations to investigate why some species differentially survived a recent mass extinction event.

Guittar will investigate the origins and evolution of Pouteria, a taxonomically confusing genus of trees with a high relative abundance in many tropical forests.  “Specifically, I am interested in exploring the roles of hybridization and reproductive isolation on tropical tree diversification,” said Guittar. “The International Institute Fellowship will support one summer of travel and help me to build connections with botanists and local students at Yasuni field station in eastern Ecuador.” 

EEB graduate student Leiling Tao has been awarded the Barbour Scholarship for 2010-11 by the Rackham Graduate School.

Tao joins a long line of outstanding women who, over the past 96 years, have become leaders in science, education, public service, medicine and other fields in their home countries all over the world. She will receive $17,200, tuition and health and dental insurance for the academic year.

In 1914, the bequest of Levi L. Barbour established a scholarship program at U-M for women of the highest academic and professional caliber from the area formerly known as the Orient (encompassing the region extending from Turkey in the west to Japan and the Philippines in the east) to study modern science, medicine, mathematics and other academic disciplines and professions critical to the development of their native lands. Tao is originally from Guangzhou, China. She graduated from Sun Yat-sen University with a bachelor's degree in ecology in 2008. Tao currently studies how resource imbalance affects species interactions under global environmental change. For her future career she plans to apply her knowledge in theoretical and applied research to natural and degraded ecosystems in China.