Harry H. Laidlaw Jr., the father of honey bee genetics. The facility, Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility, is named for him.

(Collaborative history of the UC Davis bee biology program.)

George Haymaker Vansell (1892-1954) was a student at UC Davis who eventually helped with the instruction of entomology and apiculture beginning in 1920 and ending in 1931.   In 1922 he became the first instructor to establish residence in Davis. This marked a turning point for entomology at UC Davis and reflected the growing popularity and importance of teaching in the discipline. Vansell's appointment was “Instructor in Entomology” as a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) employee in the Davis Experiment Station.  

In October of 1931 Vansell published the first edition of “Nectar and Pollen Plants of California (Bulletin 517, through UC Berkeley). That publication was later revised by Vansell and Eckert in 1941. Vansell also took an early interest in reports of colony poisoning by California buckeye (Aesculus californica Nuttall). He published the early UC Berkeley Agricultural Experiment station Circular 301, titled “Buckeye Poisoning of the Honey Bee,” in 1926. As a co-author with Frank E. Todd (USDA Bureau of Entomology), they generated two publications in 1932: “Data concerning one method of apiary management for use in the California buckeye area” and “Resistance of Hybrid Honeybee to a Plant Poison in California.”

In 1936 Vansell was an author on “A Search for a Method of Producing Honey in the Poisonous Buckeye Area in California,” in conjunction with E.L. Sechrist and Frank E. Todd, who were with the Bureau of Entomology with the USDA. The same year, Vansell joined C.E. Burnside of the USDA Bureau of Entomology and Plant Quarantine to publish “Plant Poisoning of Bees,” reporting national and international reports of bee poisonings. In 1940, Vansell teamed with William G. Watkins and Lee F. Hosbrook to publish another combined UC Berkeley and USDA report on the topic: “The Distribution of California Buckeye in the Sierra Nevada in Relation to Honey Production.” The publication contained a list of “Plants in the Sierra Nevada Providing Nectar, Pollen, or Honeydew, with their Elevation and Blossoming Period” as well as 18 local maps of the natural distribution of buckeye plants.

Vansell conducted additional research on fruit tree pollination at the USDA Pacific States Bee Culture Laboratory, Davis, California. Vansell passed away unexpectedly in his lab in 1954. A student scholarship in the Department of Entomology and Nematology bears his name.

Frank Edward Todd (1895 - 1969) was assigned to the USDA Pacific States Bee Culture Laboratory at UC Davis from 1931 to 1942. He served as head of the USDA apiculture research branch until retirement in 1965. Following his retirement, he was affiliated with UC Davis Bee Biology during the 1960s and ‘70s when he modified Norman Gary's original device and claimed the well-known “Todd Dead Bee Trap” that still is used in honey bee poisoning research.

Edward Lloyd Sechrist (1873 - 1953) was an associate agriculturist in the USDA Office of Bee Culture. Sechrist published “Transferring bees to modern hives” (Farmers' Bulletin 961) in 1918. Sechrist apparently was the first to propose: United States standards for honey: Recommended by the United States Department of Agriculture (Department circular / Unites States Department of Agriculture) in 1927. He published a “Preliminary Report on Apiary Organization and Honey Production in the Intermountain States in 1928.”

In 1930 Sechrist conducted studies on how much weight a honey bee colony gained and lost on a daily basis and reported that a colony could increase in weight by 20 pounds a day. He  wrote the textbook “Honey Getting” in 1944. “Amateur Beekeeping” appears to have undergone revision in 1955, and reprinted in ‘58, '71, and ‘76. Sechrist conducted some of his studies with personnel from the Davis bee lab.

John Edward Eckert (1895-1975) joined UC Davis as a professor of entomology and apiculture in 1931 and eventually assumed the title of “Local Chairman” – this was the title of the administrator of the department up to 1934 when the official title of vice chairman, Berkeley-Davis, was established. Eckert finished his appointment as department chairman in 1946. As a master's student, Eckert published a paper on “The Flight Range of the Honey Bee” that remains the definitive statement on the topic. Eckert conducted early studies on effects of pesticides on honey bees and worked very closely with the beekeeping industry on matters of colony management and beekeeping politics. Eckert also conducted studies on potential resistance to buckeye poisoning by various races, and crosses between races, of Caucasian, Carniolan, and Italian stocks. The results were published in 1933 as “Buckeye Poisoning of the Honeybee – A Progress Report.”

Eckert published many articles on beekeeping, edited a California column in "Gleanings in Bee Culture" for decades, and he published the first iteration of “Beekeeping in California, Circular 100,” in 1936. This publication is the basis for many revisions and title changes by various authors over the decades, including one version Eckert titled: “A Handbook on Beekeeping for California (Manual 15, 1954).”   He also published a more concise, four-page publication titled “The Home Apiary” in 1943.

Harry Hyde Laidlaw, Jr. (1907-2003) joined UC Davis as a Professor of Apiculture in 1947. His research resulted in his being called the “father of honey bee genetics” and he was the first to develop a functional instrument for artificially inseminating queen honey bees. Laidlaw pioneered research on visible mutants of honey bees (including eye colors, wing lengths, hairlessness, and pigment-free ((blind)) drones).  His genetic stocks of eye color mutants led to determination of biochemical pathways for development of eye colors and early genetic mapping of the honey bee genome. Laidlaw garnered campus, national and international awards for his research efforts. His service to the university included being appointed the first dean for research in the UC Davis College of Agriculture. The current Bee Biology Facility is named for Laidlaw, and his family established an endowment fund (student scholarships) in his name. (See In Memoriam)

Norman E. Gary (1933- ) joined UC Davis as a professor of apiculture in 1962. In the 1960s he spearheaded grant funding to construct a new bee research facility and designed our current Bee Biology facility, now the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility. Gary specialized in honey bee behavior. He did the most comprehensive research on flight range and dynamic distribution of foraging honey bees in almond orchards and various field crops by developing a novel method to recover magnetically approximately 90 percent of foragers tagged with ferrous metal ID tags, enabling the highest recapture percentage ever recorded for any insect species. During honey bee mating behavior research he was first to identify queen mating pheromones and also first to observe, describe, and photograph aerial mating behavior of queens and drones, develop aerial traps for drones, and make an award winning documentary film on mating behavior. He designed an efficient hive entrance dead bee trap that enables accurate monitoring of bee mortality inside the hive, e.g., bees killed by pesticides and diseases.

Gary led a research team to determine possible effects of microwaves on honey bees and invertebrates, as a part of the Solar Power Satellite project. In the 1970s he spearheaded the organization of the Western Apicultural Society and served as its first president. Since his retirement in 1994, Gary has written chapters for several honey bee text books as well as a book (“Honey Bee Hobbyist: The Care and Keeping of Bees,” 2010). For more than 40 years, he consulted with TV and film companies as a bee wrangler and stunt coordinator for producing educational documentaries and entertaining productions, resulting in 17 movies, 6 commercials, and more than 50 television programs. He is also a lifetime professional musician, performing and recording on clarinet, tenor and alto saxophones, and flute.

Robbin W. Thorp (1933 - 2019) joined UC Davis as a professor of apiculture in 1964. Thorp specialized in pollination behavior of honey bee and native bees. Thorp devoted a good deal of time to almond pollination and contributed information that still is applicable in this national, Herculean, single-crop pollination effort. But, he also maintained an interest in non-Apis bees. He published the book “Bumble Bees and Cuckoo Bumble Bees of California (Hymenoptera: Apidae) in the Bulletin of the California Insect Survey, with Lorry Dunning in 1983. As emeritus professor (retired 1994), Thorp continued to work avidly with native bees until his death on June 7, 2019. In 2014, he co-authored a“Bumble Bees of North America: An Identification Guide” (Princeton University Press) and another titled: “California Bees and Blooms, a Guide for Gardeners and Naturalists" (Heyday).

Ward Stanger (1913-2000) shifted his extension responsibilities from Extension entomologist to Extension apiculturist when the honey bee researchers were being overwhelmed with requests for beekeeping information during the age of counter culturalism in the 1960s and ‘70s. Stanger was readily adopted by the beekeeping industry as a spokesman for their concerns. In 1971 he joined forces with the Davis researchers and California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) representatives to publish “Manual 42: Fundamentals of California Beekeeping.” This publication was revised and retitled “Beekeeping in California,” but the basic information remains pretty similar to the original. In 1969 Stanger co-authored, with Dr. William C. Roberts from what is now known as the USDA-ARS Baton Rouge Bee Lab, an article in the American Bee Journal titled “Survey of the Package Bee and Queen Industry.” It was the first comparison of how the northern California and southeastern Gulf States bee breeders conducted their businesses. Stanger became involved in research of honey bee nutrition, since most honey bee colonies kept commercially in California require some supplemental feed to increase brood rearing for various reasons. Together with Harry Laidlaw, Stanger fed 40 colonies feeds containing various concentrations of pollen, Wheast, and sugar syrup. The results: “Supplemental Feeding of Honeybees” were published the year he retired from the university, 1974.

Christine Y. S. Peng (1944- ) joined the Department of Entomology as a professor of apiculture in 1975. Peng was an insect physiologist and she devoted her studies to searching for solutions to honey bee problems. She spent a good deal of time searching for a replacement antibiotic for oxytetracycline hydrochloride (Terramycin^®) when American foulbrood was becoming resistant. With Drs. Terrance Leighton and Eric Mussen, Peng selected tylosin as the top candidate, which is being used internationally today. Peng also provided considerable knowledge on the topic of honey bee nutrition, including determining the best times of the year to provide supplemental feed to the colonies. Peng retired from the University in 2005.

Eric Carnes Mussen (1944- ) joined University Cooperative Extension as extension apiculturist in 1976. Mussen became involved in many different honey bee studies, often in conjunction with one of the department Professors. He became fully integrated into the world of non-commercial and commercial beekeeping. As his experiences broadened, he became a recognizable voice for beekeeping matters with county farm advisors, agricultural organizations, California agencies, NGOs, and the EPA. Mussen retired in 2014, but still remains in contact with industry matters.

Robert E. Page, Jr. (1949 - ) completed his doctorate in entomology at UC Davis, with a strong emphasis on insect genetics. After a couple years as professor at Ohio State University, Page returned to UC Davis in 1989 to further his research in honey bee genetics. During his 15 years at UC Davis, including an appointment as department chairman, and 11 more at Arizona State University (ASU), Page published hundreds of papers, four books, and led to the discovery of many fundamental tenets of honey bee behavior and population genetics and the focus of his current research is on the evolution of complex social behavior. Using the honey bee as a model, Dr. Page has dissected their complex foraging division of labor at all levels of biological organization from gene networks to complex social interactions. Page served as Foundation Chair of Life Sciences at ASU and provost (now emeritus) at Arizona State University.

Current Faculty Members

Neal Williams joined the department in 2009 as an assistant professor, coming from an exemplary background in college teaching to a position that would allow more creative research. Williams is now professor of entomology and a core faculty member with the Agricultural Sustainability Institute. His work ranges from basic research in bee biology and pollination to applied research on native bee conservation and crop pollination. He investigates the evolution and ecology of pollen specialization (oligolecty) by bees and how such specialists contribute to plant reproduction compared to generalists (polyleges). He also explores the role of habitat connectivity for the persistence of bees in agri-natural landscapes and how pollination service by native bee species is affected by land use change and human disturbance. Finally, he is working to develop native plant mixtures to bolster populations of the honey bee and wild bee species and promote sustainable pollination in different agricultural systems.

Brian Ricky Johnson joined the department as a bee behaviorist in 2012. Johnson continues studies on the genetics, behavior, evolution, and health of honey bees. Approaches to honey bee health studies incorporate a combination of genetics, epidemiology, and physiological approaches. His current work focuses on the evolution and genetic basis of social behavior using comparative and functional genomics, task allocation using behavioral and theoretical approaches, and honey bee health using a combination of genetics, epidemiology, and physiological approaches. He also is attempting to better determine where genes from Africanized honey bees have gained entry into the regional bee populations around the state.

Elina Lastro Niño joined the department as Extension apiculturist in 2014. She arrived with a very strong background in bees and beekeeping, and she immediately began visiting beekeepers throughout the state to become familiar with California beekeeping. Niño devotes her major research focus to queen honey bees and the physiological changes they undergo as they mature, become inseminated, and begin laying eggs. But she also is concerned about the pesticide problems vexing honey bee colonies and is conducting research in that area. She established the California Master Beekeeper Program in 2016. She is the bee biology program's third Extension apiculturist and the only Extension apiculturist in California.

(Editor's Note: See history of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology)

Charlotte Herbert Alberts with an assassin fly.

You can learn about those topics—and much more—at the UC Davis Bohart Museum of Entomology when it hosts an open house themed “Time Flies When You Are Studying Insects: Cutting Edge Student Research,” on Saturday, Jan. 18.

The event, free and family friendly, will be held from 1 to 4 p.m. in Room 1124 of the Academic Surge Building on Crocker Lane, UC Davis campus.

“We will have a diversity of topics,” said Tabatha Yang, education and outreach coordinator for the Bohart Museum. “I just love how this university excels at interdisciplinary research. We may be the Entomology and Nematology Department but we are connected to so many fields of research. “Our grads are our future's hope and here they are inspiring others."

Doctoral students who will showcase their research are:

• Entomologist Yao Cai of the Joanna Chiu lab, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology,
• Entomologist Charlotte Herbert Alberts, who studies assassin flies with major professor Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum of Entomology and professor of entomology
• Entomologist-ant specialist Zachary Griebenow of the Phil Ward lab, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology
• Forest entomologist Crystal Homicz who studies with Joanna Chiu and research forest entomologist Chris Fettig, Pacific Southwest Research Station, USDA Forest Service, Davis. (She formerly studied with the late Steve Seybold of USDA Forest Service and the Department of Entomology and Nematology.)
• Forensic entomologist Alexander Dedmon, who studies with Robert Kimsey, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology
• Ecologist Ann Holmes, affiliated with the Graduate Group in Ecology, Department of Animal Science, and the Genomic Variation Laboratory, studies with major professors Andrea Schreier and Mandi Finger.

Yao Cai
Yao Cai, a fourth-year doctoral student, studies circadian clock in insects.  “Using Drosophila melanogaster (fruit fly) and Danaus plexippus (monarch butterfly), as models, we seek to understand how these insects receive environmental time cues and tell time, how they organize their daily rhythms in physiology and behavior, such as feeding, sleep and migration (in monarch butterfly),” Cai said.

“Since clock design is conserved from fly to human, understanding how fly clock works can be translated into knowledge and treatment for people who undergo clock disruption in their daily lives, such as jet lag, shift work,” Cai said. 

Visitors will learn how fruit flies and monarch butterflies tell time, why the clock is important to them, and the tools scientists use to study circadian clock.

Zachary Griebenow
Zachary Griebenow, a third-year doctoral student, will be showcasing or discussing specimens of the ant subfamily Leptanillinae, most of them male.

“I will be showing specimens of the Leptanillinae under the microscope, emphasizing the great morphological diversity observed in males and talking about my systematic revision of the subfamily," he said. "In particular, I want to explain how the study of an extremely obscure group of ants can help us understand the process of evolution that has given rise to all organisms."

Crystal Homicz
“Did you know that between 1987 and 2017 bark beetles were responsible for more tree death than wildfire?” asks Crystal Homicz, a first-year doctoral student.  “Bark beetles are an incredibly important feature of forests, especially as disturbance agents. My research focuses on how bark beetles and fire interact, given that these are the two most important disturbance agents of the Sierra Nevada. At my table, I will discuss how the interaction between bark beetles and fire, why bark beetles and fire are important feature of our forest ecosystem, and I will discuss more generally the importance of bark beetles in many forest systems throughout North America.

“I will have several wood samples, insect specimens and photographs to display what bark beetle damage looks like, and the landscape level effects bark beetles have. I will also have samples of wood damage caused by other wood boring beetles and insects. My table will focus widely on the subject of forest entomology and extend beyond beetle-fire interactions.”

Visitors, she said, can expect to leave with a clear understanding of what bark beetles are and what they do, as well as a deeper understanding of the importance of disturbance ecology in our temperate forests.

Charlotte Alberts
Charlotte Alberts, a fifth-year doctoral candidate, will display assassin flies and their relatives, as well as examples of prey they eat and/or mimic. Visitors can expect to learn about basic assassin fly ecology and evolution. 

Alberts studies the evolution of assassin flies (Diptera: Asilidae) and their relatives. “Assassin flies are voracious predators on other insects and are able to overcome prey much larger than themselves,” she said. “Both adult and larval assassin flies are venomous. Their venom consists of neurotoxins that paralyze their prey, and digestive enzymes that allow assassin flies to consume their prey in a liquid form. These flies are incredibly diverse, ranging in size from 5-60mm, and can be found all over the world! With over 7,500 species, Asilidae is the third most specious family of flies. Despite assassin flies being very common, most people do not even know of their existence. This may be due to their impressive ability to mimic other insects, mainly wasps, and bees.” 

For her thesis, she is trying to resolve the phylogenetic relationships of Asiloidea (Asilidae and their relatives) using Ultra Conserved Elements (UCEs), and morphology. "I am also interested in evolutionary trends of prey specificity within Asilidae, which may be one of the major driving forces leading to this family's diversity."

Ann Holmes, fourth-year doctoral student

"Visitors can expect to learn how DNA is used to detect insects in bat guano (poop)."

"Insects in bat poop are hard to identify because they have been digested, but I can use DNA to determine which insects are there," she said. "We care about which insects bats eat because bats are natural pest controllers. With plenty of bats we can use less pesticide on farms and less mosquito repellent on ourselves."

Alexander Dedmon
Forensic entomologist Alex Dedmon, a sixth-year doctoral student, will display tools and text and explain what forensic entomology is all about. "My research focuses on insect succession. In forensic entomology, succession uses the patterns of insects that come and go from a body. These patterns help us estimate how long a person has been dead. Visitors can expect to learn about the many different ways insects can be used as evidence, and what that evidence tells us."

Dedmon recently won first place in a contest at the Entomological Society of America meeting in St. Louis. As he explained in a Facebook post: "Trécé, Inc. is a company that creates olfactory baits and traps for insects. They had a contest at their booth looking for ideas to expand their research and product line. Most of this sort of thing is generally used for surveillance of insect pests, which I don't do much work in. Still, I figured I had nothing to lose by at least trying.  So, I pointed out that forensic entomologists often have to sample blowfly populations from the region in order to establish species presence for future casework"

"To sample those flies, we usually use a carrion source like a dead pig. Unfortunately, carrion tends to be surprisingly expensive. Also, we have to usually place it in a remote location (the general public doesn't care much for seeing rotting pigs)."

"However, we know that blowflies mainly orient themselves off of smell. In other words, they are attracted by the aromatic compounds emitted as part of the decomposition process. It's these compounds that make the pigs "stink." Many of them have been identified, and have wonderfully illustrative names like 'cadaverine.' So, if those compounds were applied to a sticky trap, you'd (hypothetically) have a cheaper, less unsightly method for sampling blowflies."

"Not bad for improvising an idea on the spot," he quipped.

Other Activities at the Open House
The family craft activity will be painting rocks, which can be taken home or hidden around campus. "Hopefully some kind words on rocks found by random strangers can also make for a kinder better future,” Yang said.

In addition to meeting and chatting with the researchers, visitors can see insect specimens (including butterflies and moths), meet the critters in the live “petting zoo” (including Madagascar hissing cockroaches, walking sticks and tarantulas) and browse the gift shop, containing books, insect-themed t-shirts and sweatshirts, jewelry, insect-collecting equipment and insect-themed candy.

The Bohart Museum, founded by noted entomologist Richard M. Bohart (1913-2007), houses a global collection of nearly eight million specimens. It is also the home of the seventh largest insect collection in North America, and the California Insect Survey, a storehouse of insect biodiversity.

The insect museum is open to the public Mondays through Thursdays from 9 a.m. to noon and 1 to 5 p.m., except on holidays. More information on the Bohart Museum is available on the website at http://bohart.ucdavis.edu or by contacting (530) 752-0493 or bmuseum@ucdavis.edu.

Valerie Williamson, co-author

The nine-member research team, led by Frank Schroeder, a BTI professor and also a professor in Cornell University's Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, detailed how plants speak “roundworm language” for self-defense. The work is published Jan. 10 in the journal Nature Communications.

The researchers studied chemicals called ascarosides, which the worms produce and secrete to communicate with each other. Williamson helped analyze the data and helped make some key insights toward the paper's conclusions, the BTI scientists related.

The team found that plants “talk” to nematodes by metabolizing ascarosides and secreting the metabolites back into the soil.

“It's not only that the plant can ‘sense' or ‘smell' a nematode,” Schroeder said in a BTI news release. “It's that the plant learns a foreign language, and then broadcasts something in that language to spread propaganda that ‘this is a bad place.' Plants mess with nematodes' communications system to drive them away.”

The study built on the team's previous work showing that plants react to ascr#18 – the predominant ascaroside secreted by plant-infecting nematodes – by bolstering their own immune defenses, thereby protecting them against many types of pests and pathogens.

In those earlier studies, “We also saw that when ascr#18 was given to plants, the chemical disappears over time,” according to lead author Murli Manohar, a senior research associate at BTI.

That observation, along with published literature suggesting plants could modify pest metabolites, led the team to hypothesize that “plants and nematodes interact via small molecule signaling and alter one another's messages,” Schroeder said.

To probe that idea, the team treated three plant species – Arabidopsis, wheat and tomato – with ascr#18 and compared compounds found in treated and untreated plants. They identified three ascr#18 metabolites, the most abundant of which was ascr#9.

The researchers also found Arabidopsis and tomato roots secreted the three metabolites into the soil, and that a mixture of 90% ascr#9 and 10% ascr#18 added to the soil steered nematodes away from the plant's roots, thereby reducing infection.

The team hypothesized that nematodes in the soil perceive the mixture as a signal, sent by plants already infected with nematodes, to “go away” and prevent overpopulation of a single plant. Worms may have evolved to hijack plant metabolism to send this signal. Plants, in turn, may have evolved to tamper with the signal to appear as heavily infected as possible, thereby fooling would-be invaders.

“This is a dimension of their relationship that no one has seen before,” said Manohar. “And plants may have similar types of chemical communication with other pests.”

Although the mixture of ascr#9 and ascr#18 could serve as a crop protectant, Schroeder said there should be no detriment to using straight ascr#18 on crops, as described in the team's earlier research.

“Ascr#18 mainly primes the plant to respond more quickly and strongly to a pathogen, rather than fully inducing the defensive response itself,” he said. “So there should be no cost to the plant in terms of reduced growth, yield or other problems.”

The team also showed that plants metabolize ascr#18 via the peroxisomal β-oxidation pathway, a system conserved across many plant species.

“This paper uncovers an ancient interaction,” Schroeder said. “All nematodes make ascarosides, and plants have had millions of years to learn how to manipulate these molecules.”

He added: “Plants aren't passive green things. They are active participants in an interactive dialog with the surrounding environment, and we will continue to decipher this dialog.”

These discoveries are being commercialized by a BTI and Cornell University-based startup company, Ascribe Bioscience, as a family of crop protection products named PhytalixTM.

Scientists affiliated with four institutions--BTI, Cornell, UC Davis and the USDA's Robert W. Holley Center for Agriculture and Health--co-authored the paper. Grants from USDA and the National Institutes of Health funded the research.

Sources:

• EurkAlert news release
• Cornell Chronicle news release
• Valerie Williamson biosketch

Noted entomologist Corrie Moreau (Photo by Roberto Keller-Perez)

Moreau is the Moser Professor of Biosystematics and Biodiversity, Departments of Entomology and Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. and the curator of the Cornell University Insect Collection.

"Moreau and colleagues were the first to establish the origin of the ants at 140 million years ago using molecular sequence data (40 million years older than previous estimates), and that the diversification of the ants coincided with the rise of the flowering plants (angiosperms)," according to an entry in Wikipedia. "In addition, Moreau and Charles D. Bell showed that the tropics have been and continue to be important for the evolution of the ants. Moreau and colleagues have demonstrated the importance of gut-associated bacteria in the evolutionary and ecological success of ants through targeted bacterial and microbiome sequencing, including showing that bacterial gut symbionts are tightly linked with the evolution of herbivory in ants."

Her honors are many. In 2018 she was elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Also in 2018, she was featured in National Geographic as a "Woman of Impact." In 2015, she was included in "15 Brilliant Women Bridging the Gender Gap in Science."

A native of New Orleans, Moreau holds degrees (bachelor and master's)  from San Francisco State University and a doctorate in biology from Harvard University (2007). At Harvard, she studied with major professors E. O. Wilson and Naomi Pierce. Wilson featured her in his 2013 book, Letter to a Young Scientist.

"There was no bravado in Corrie, no trace of overweening pride, no pretension,"  Wilson wrote. "The story of Corrie Saux Moreau's ambitious undertaking is one I feel especially important to bring to you. It suggests that courage in science born of self-confidence (without arrogance!), a willingness to take a risk but with resilience, a lack of fear of authority, a set of mind that prepares you to take a new direction if thwarted, are of great value – win or lose."

Moreau will cover diverse topics in her talk. "To fully understand the macro evolutionary factors that have promoted the diversification and persistence of biological diversity, varied tools and disciplines must be integrated," she says in her abstract. "By combining data from several fields, including molecular phylogenetics/phylogenomics, comparative genomics, biogeographic range reconstruction, stable isotyope analyses, and microbial community sequencing to study the evolutionary history of the insects, we are beginning to understand the drivers of speciation and the interconnectedness of life. Comparative phylogenetic analysis reveals the interconnectedness of ants and plants and that ants diversified after the rise of the angiosperms. Comparative genomics has permitted the exploration of the role of symbiosis on genome evolution and behavioral gene evolution demonstrating that Red Queen dynamics are at play in obligate mutualisms..."

"Microbial contributions to ants are not limited to diet enrichment," she says, "and we find evidence for their role in cuticle formation. These multiple lines of evidence are illuminating a more complete picture of ant evolution and providing novel insights into the role that symbiosis plays to promote biological diversity."

UC Davis graduate student Marshall McMunn of the Phil Ward lab is the host. Community ecologist Rachel Vannette, assistant professor (rlvannette@ucdavis.edu), coordinates the weekly seminars. See seminar schedule.