Postdoctoral Research: North Carolina State University and North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences
Urbanization, Biodiversity, and Museum Collections
Human altered habitats have very different characteristics than natural ones. They have more impermeable surface area, tend to be warmer than surrounding natural areas (urban head island effect), and fragment natural and semi-natural environments. Depending on the previous land use of the area, urbanization can potentially increase habitat heterogeneity, allowing for a subset of native species, and many introduced and pest species, to call cities home. Traditionally, studies substitute space for time by using urbanization gradients from natural areas to cities to see how urbanization intensity alters species richness and abundance. While this provides useful insight into the changes that urbanization is associated with, it assumes that ecological communities respond similarly across temporal scales. Using temporal gradients, repeatedly sampling the same location through time, could help to validate this assumption. However, long-term studies of biodiversity and urbanization are uncommon. To address this gap, myself and collaborators will use museum collections to go back in time and use museum collections to see how bee biodiversity has changed over time and with urbanization in Wake County, North Carolina over the past ~100 years.
Human altered habitats have very different characteristics than natural ones. They have more impermeable surface area, tend to be warmer than surrounding natural areas (urban head island effect), and fragment natural and semi-natural environments. Depending on the previous land use of the area, urbanization can potentially increase habitat heterogeneity, allowing for a subset of native species, and many introduced and pest species, to call cities home. Traditionally, studies substitute space for time by using urbanization gradients from natural areas to cities to see how urbanization intensity alters species richness and abundance. While this provides useful insight into the changes that urbanization is associated with, it assumes that ecological communities respond similarly across temporal scales. Using temporal gradients, repeatedly sampling the same location through time, could help to validate this assumption. However, long-term studies of biodiversity and urbanization are uncommon. To address this gap, myself and collaborators will use museum collections to go back in time and use museum collections to see how bee biodiversity has changed over time and with urbanization in Wake County, North Carolina over the past ~100 years.
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Public Perception of Museum Collections and Scientists
Natural history collections are largely publicly funded, but large portions of the collections themselves are not easily accessible to the public. These collections tends to be housed off site, or in basements where the public cannot go. As a result, museums are often undervalued, with funding for preservation and curation decreasing in recent years. Additionally, scientists face public perception challenges, being perceived as competent but cold. Therefore, myself and collaborators are asking if there are ways we can frame and present the basic research that museum collections support in a way that increases public appreciation, and support, of museum collections and the scientists that conduct this work. Currently there is one publication regarding this research [5]. |
Image description: Scientist sitting in front of a microscope talking about their work on-screen.
Photo credit: Adrian Smith, NCSU and NC Museum of Natural Sciences |
Funding Source: This research is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Division of Biological Infrastructure (DBI) Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology-1906242.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.
Graduate Research: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Ant-Mediated Seed Dispersal (AMSD)
A majority of AMSD focusses on myrmecochorous plants that have a food reward (called an elaiosome) attached to their seeds. Foraging ants carry the seed and elaiosome (the diaspore) back to their nest, feed the elaiosome to the brood and then discard the seed intact in a waste site either inside or outside of the nest. These waste sites are thought to be nutritious microsites for germination and growth. Plant species that are not known to have, or do not have, a conspicuous elaiosome food reward to ant dispersers have received must less research attention but it is highly possible that they also engage in AMSD.
A majority of AMSD focusses on myrmecochorous plants that have a food reward (called an elaiosome) attached to their seeds. Foraging ants carry the seed and elaiosome (the diaspore) back to their nest, feed the elaiosome to the brood and then discard the seed intact in a waste site either inside or outside of the nest. These waste sites are thought to be nutritious microsites for germination and growth. Plant species that are not known to have, or do not have, a conspicuous elaiosome food reward to ant dispersers have received must less research attention but it is highly possible that they also engage in AMSD.
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AMSD of Neotropical Pioneer Tree Species
My dissertation focused on research conducted on and around the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute's Barro Colorado Island (BCI; Isla Barro Colorado) research station in the Republic of Panama (on map to the right). AMSD of Seeds Lacking Elaiosomes: Myself and collaborators have established through the use of seed caches of pioneer tree species that the seeds of some plant species that are not known to have elaiosomes are removed by ants. We are currently investigating the chemical mechanism that elicits the seed carrying response in ants. Without providing a food reward, these seeds may be exploiting the behavior of ants especially if the ants do not have the mandible morphology of processing the seeds themselves for food. |
Seed Dispersal in Pioneer Tree Species: In order to regenerate, plants are limited by the amount seeds they produce (source limiation) and the number of suitable microsites (microstie limitation) for germination. Pioneer species are dispersal limited. They produce a large number of seeds but few of those seeds reach suitable microsites for germination and establishment. These suitable microsties are characterized by high light environments such as forest edges or gaps. Seeds can either be dispersed long distances into these gaps or enter into the soil seed bank, remaining dormant and viable until favorable conditions occur. Some pioneer species able able to remain viable in the soil for 30+ years. As a result, we believe that ground nesting ants may act as both a secondary disperser of seeds and provide a way for small seeded pioneers to become incorporated in the soil seed bank. Determining if ants eat or cache the seeds they move is an ongoing project.
Funding Sources: This research was at least partially funded by University of Illinois Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship-Vertically Integrated Training with Genomics (IGERT-ViNTG) training fellowship from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Department of Graduate Education Grant-1069157, NSF Division of Environmental Biology Grant-1120205, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI)-Butler University internship program, NSF Doctoral Dissertation Improvement grant-1701501, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) Dissertation Travel Grant, STRI Short-term Fellowship, and the Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service, US Department of Agriculture project number-ILLU 875-952.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.
Publications resulting from this research: [1], [4], [6], and one additional manuscript in preparation.
Undergraduate Research: Rutgers University
Garlic Mustard (Alliaria petiolata Brassicaceae) and Cabbage White Butterflies (Pieris rapae Lepidoptera)
For my undergraduate degree in Ecology and Natural Resources, I attended Rutgers University New Brunswick campus. There I conducted a G. H. Cook Senior Thesis under the guidance of Dr. Steven N. Handel and, then graduate student, Elena Tartaglia. We investigated at the impact of the invasive herb garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata) on the cabbage white butterfly (Pieris rapae, synonym: imported cabbageworm). My senior thesis investigated the patterns of oviposition and caterpillar survivorship of P. rapae on A. petiolata. We found that cabbage white butterflies preferentially landed and oviposited on garlic mustard over a native toothwort (Cardamine diphylla, synonym: Dentaria diphylla) in field plots. We also found that caterpillars were more likely to pupate when fed garlic mustard than commercially grown kale (Brassica oleracea).
For my undergraduate degree in Ecology and Natural Resources, I attended Rutgers University New Brunswick campus. There I conducted a G. H. Cook Senior Thesis under the guidance of Dr. Steven N. Handel and, then graduate student, Elena Tartaglia. We investigated at the impact of the invasive herb garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata) on the cabbage white butterfly (Pieris rapae, synonym: imported cabbageworm). My senior thesis investigated the patterns of oviposition and caterpillar survivorship of P. rapae on A. petiolata. We found that cabbage white butterflies preferentially landed and oviposited on garlic mustard over a native toothwort (Cardamine diphylla, synonym: Dentaria diphylla) in field plots. We also found that caterpillars were more likely to pupate when fed garlic mustard than commercially grown kale (Brassica oleracea).
