- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
This is part of the Forest Biology Research Center's Seminar Series coordinated by David Neale (dbneale@ucdavis.edu). David Rizzo is the host for the Seybold seminar.
A chemical ecologist specializing in forest insects, Seybold has studied the chemical ecology and behavior of bark beetles and related wood-boring insects for nearly 30 years and has published more than 150 peer-reviewed scientific papers, book chapters, and technical and outreach reports on the topic.
Seybold holds a bachelor of science degree in forest resources from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a doctorate in entomology from UC Berkeley. His main interests include host selection and chemically mediated behaviors of bark beetles in conifers and hardwoods, as well as the behavior and biology of subsequent wood-degrading insects. Project areas range from molecular biology of pheromone production to the activity and detection of pheromones at the landscape level and the evolution of chemical communication systems of forest insects.
Seybold's research projects focus on the application of pheromones and other semiochemicals to forest management and to the detection of invasive species. He led a research effort that provided the first direct evidence for de novo biosynthesis of pheromones in bark beetles and continues to remain interested in the relationship between host biochemistry and insect metabolism in pheromone biosynthesis, which resulted in publications in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA and the Annual Review of Entomology.