- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The 24-hour Zoom event, to begin at 9 a.m., Wednesday, Aug. 11, Pacific Daylight Time (PDT), will cover such topics as why mosquitoes are so persistent; the origins of insect olfaction; bitter perspectives (and insect taste); and novelty detection in the early olfactory processing of the honey bee.
“We will have 15 invited (keynote) and 36 contribution presentations,” said Leal, who will host the PDT segment. One of the interviews will feature olfaction research pioneer Karl-Ernst Kaissling of Germany.
Co-hosts with Leal are Wynand van der Goes van Naters of Cardiff University, UK, who will host the British Summer Time (BST) segment; and Coral Warr of La Trobe University, Australia (formerly of the University of Tasmania), host of the Australia Eastern Standard Time (AEST) segment. The trio, along with Karen Menuz (PDT), Wei Xu (AEST), and Emmanuelle Jacquin-Joly (BST), will moderate the symposium.
“The attendees will be engaged by questions and answers,” announced Leal, a UC Davis distinguished professor with the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology and a former chair of the Department of Entomology (now the Department of Entomology and Nematology). “We will give priority to questions from students, postdocs, and early career professionals, but will attempt to address everyone's questions. Attendees can ask anonymous questions.” Many of the attendees would not otherwise have an opportunity to travel to an international symposium, he added.
The first segment--the PDT segment hosted by Leal--begins with a welcoming address by John Hildebrand of the University of Arizona, International Secretary of the National Academy of Sciences. Presentations by Josefina del Marmol of The Rockefeller University, New York, and Jon Clardy of Harvard Medical School will follow. “There will be four keynote lectures and 10 contributed presentations,” Leal said.
The last presentation in this segment, by Ke Dong of Duke University, will bridge with the AEST segment, hosted by Warr. It will include two keynote lectures and 14 contributed presentations. Then, a keynote lecture by Richard Benton of the University of Laussanne will bridge with the BST segment, hosted by van der Goes van Naters. It will include six keynote lectures and 12 contributed presentations. After the last lecture by John Pickett of Cardiff University) the symposium returns to UC Davis for closing remarks.
The list of keynote speakers and their topics:
PDT Segment
- Anupama Dahanukar, UC Riverside, Adaptive taste variation in Drosophila
- Jeff Riffell, University of Washington, The olfactory gating of visual preferences to human skin and colors in mosquitoes
- Leslie Vosshall, The Rockefeller University, Why are mosquitoes so persistent?
- Zain Syed, University of Kentucky, Insect olfaction in the era of genomes, transcriptomes, and proteomes
AEST Segment
- Guirong Wang, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Molecular mechanism of olfactory coding in Helicoverpa armigera and its application
- Ke Dong, Duke University, A dual-target molecular mechanism of pyrethrum repellency against mosquitoes
- Melissa Jordan, Plant and Food Research, New Zealand, The origins of insect olfaction
- Richard Benton, University of Lausanne, Evolution of olfactory circuitry in drosophilids
BST Segment
- Frederic Marion-Poll, University Paris-Saclay, at AgroParistech, Bitter perspectives (and insect taste)
- Greg Jefferis, University of Cambridge, Olfactory circuits: whole brain connectomics to behavior
- John Pickett, Cardiff University, The role of chemistry in contextual olfactory signaling to insects
- Marcus Stensmyr, Lund University, Molecular basis of natural insect repellents
- Silke Sachse, Max Planck Institute – Jena, Olfactory learning modulates a neural circuit mediating innate odor-guided behavior in Drosophila
- Sylvia Anton, French National Institute for Agricultural Research, Plasticity in pest insect olfaction
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The list of contributed presentations:
PDT Segment
- Ben Matthews, Molecular and neural basis of salt taste in mosquitoes
- Carolina Reisenman, Taste specializations in specialist Drosophila sechellia
- Chris Potter, Olfactory responses to insect repellents in Anopheles malaria mosquitoes
- Craig Montell, Drosophila receptors controlling chemical and textural taste sensation
- Erika Plettner, Mechanisms of molecular recognition of odorant-binding proteins
- Hany Dweck, Evolutionary shifts in taste coding in the fruit pest Drosophila suzukii
- Jason Pitts, Indolergic receptors in the housefly, Musca domestica
- Jessica Zung, Chemical signatures of human odour and implications for mosquito olfactory evolution
- Mahmut Demir, Dynamic switch between ON and OFF responses in an olfactory receptor neuron
- Preeti Sareen, A neuronal network for gustatory decision making under conflicting taste information in Drosophila
- Walter Leal, Swapping mosquito odorant receptor domains to probe specificity
- Zepeng Yao, Serotonergic neurons translate taste detection into internal nutrient regulation
AEST Segment
- Alice French, Sensory processing during sleep in Drosophila melanogaster
- Aniruddha Agnihotri, Unfolding the truth behind refolding of insect Odorant Binding Proteins
- Brian Smith, Novelty detection in early olfactory processing of the honey bee, Apis mellifera
- Chen-Zhu Wang, A gustatory receptor tuned to sinigrin in the cabbage butterfly Pieris rapae
- David Heckel, bric à brac controls sex pheromone choice by male European corn borer moths
- Helen Rushby, The role of olfaction in macronutrient balancing in Drosophila melanogaster
- Hidehiro Watanabe, Postembryonic development of sex pheromone reception in the American cockroach<
- Kosuke Tateishi, Functional analysis of odorant receptor co-receptor (Orco) in the antennae of the American cockroach
- Paul Cunningham, A blend of fruit and fungal volatiles shows promise for mass trapping female Queensland fruit fly
- Paul Szyszka, Rapid evolution of olfactory degradation in recently flightless insects
- Pinky Kain, Starvation and activity dependent modulation of salt taste in Drosophila
- Nobuaki Tanaka, A sexually dimorphic olfactory neuron mediates fixed action transition during courtship ritual in Drosophila melanogaster<
- Teruyuki Matsunaga, Evolution of olfactory receptors tuned to mustard oils in herbivorous Drosophilidae
- Yinliang Wang, Peripheral olfactory sensing of plant volatiles and their potentially applications in Northeast China
BST Segment
- Ben Paffhausen, A flying platform to investigate neuronal correlates of navigation in the honey bee (Apis mellifera)
- Bente Berg, Distinct protocerebral neuropils associated with attractive and aversive female-produced odorants in the male moth brain
- Danila Kolesov, Insect chemoreceptors in a mammalian chemogenetics
- Emmanuelle Jacquin-Joly, Function of odorant receptors in a moth
- Ilona Grunwald Kadow, A learning circuit is involved in mating state-dependent olfactory behavior of Drosophila females
- Jonathan Bohbot, Indolergic odorant receptors are an ancient feature of dipteran olfactory systems
- Julia Mariette, Functional study of the queen pheromone receptor OR11 in honey bees within the genus Apis
- Mario Pannunzi, Non-synaptic interactions in olfactory receptor neurons, a peripheral odour coding?
- Naoko Toshima, A rewarding and a punishing effect of amino acid taste in larval Drosophila
- Sharon Hill, Age matters: regulation of antennal transcription throughout a mosquito's first gonotrophic cycle
- Xi Chu, Neuronal architecture of the CO2 pathway in the brain of a noctuid moth
- Yael Grosjean, Adult sex-specific vigilance via olfactory receptor inhibition in Drosophila
The registrants hail from 66 countries: Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Denmark, Dominica, Ecuador, Egypt, Ethiopia, Finland, France, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Guatemala, Hungary, India, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kenya, South Korea, Lebanon, Mexico, Mozambique, Nepal, Norway, Pakistan, Peru, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Réunion, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Tanzania, Cayman Islands, Czech Republic, The Netherlands, The Philippines, United Kingdom, United States, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, United States Minor Outlying Islands, Uruguay, and Vietnam.
For updates, videos and more information, follow Leal on Twitter at @wsleal2014.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The 10 Fellows were announced today.
Hoover, who received her doctorate in entomology from UC Davis in June, 1997, studied with major professors Sean Duffey (1943-1997) and Bruce Hammock. Hoover joined the PSU faculty as an assistant professor in 1998, achieving full professor in 2010.
Hoover's areas of expertise include biology and ecology of invasive species, insect-microbial symbiosis, tritrophic interactions, insect virology, and pollination of forest trees.
She is active in PSU's Center for Chemical Ecology, Center for Pollinator Research, and the Insect Biodiversity Center.
“Hoover is internationally recognized for uncovering detailed mechanisms of how phytochemicals reduce mortality by baculoviruses through physiological impacts on the larva's midgut (epithelial cells and peritrophic matrix,” said nominator Gary Felton, professor and head of the PSU Department of Entomology. Hoover and her co-advisors “patented baculovirus formulation additives that counteract these physiological effects, and thus increase the sensitivity of larvae to infections.”
“Kelli was a delight to have in the laboratory at UC Davis,” said Hammock, now a UC Davis distinguished professor who holds a joint appointment with the Department of Entomology and Nematology and the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center. “She started her Ph.D. at Davis at an exciting time when we were trying to move recombinant baculoviruses into practical agriculture as green pesticides. Among the laboratories of Sean Duffey, Susumu Maeda, Kevin Heinz and extramural collaborators around the world, we had an exciting critical mass ranging, including virology, peptide chemistry, scorpion venoms, genetic engineering, pest management and others.”
“Kelli's interest in tritrophic interactions and her outgoing and engaging personality were just what was needed to pull the team together,” said Hammock, a 2010 Fellow. “As one would expect, Kelli's talents in science and leadership have served her well at Penn State. There her baculovirus work transitioned into a broader program in gypsy moth control and the invasion of the Asian longhorned beetle provided an opportunity to look at gut symbionts. Every project that Kelli touches seems to yield exciting results with practical implications. I am thrilled that the ESA has recognized what a star she is in our field.”
UC Davis doctoral alumnus Bryony Bonning, a professor at the University of Florida and a 2013 ESA Fellow, commented that “Kelli is so deserving of this award.”
“I worked with Kelli for two, delightful years at UC Davis, and was particularly impressed by the number of undergraduate students that she managed to mentor at the bench!” Bonning said. “Since then, she has established a stellar research program that has recently focused on both the fundamental biology and management solutions for invasive pests including Asian longhorned beetle (ALB) and spotted lantern fly. Analysis of ALB semiochemicals resulted in a blend now sold by two companies and used in North America and Europe for ALB management."
“In collaboration with engineers, she has also spearheaded development of a method to prevent introduction of invasive species in the wood packing associated with international shipments,” Bonning noted. “This dielectric heating technology, used to treat and kill insects hidden in the wood packing, is at the stage of commercial equipment prototype. These examples reflect both the interdisciplinary breadth of Kelli's research program and the seamless melding of science to address fundamental questions that lead to practical solutions. This breadth of scope and ability to identify commercially useful components of the system is a relatively rare phenotype among entomologists! Further, Kelli is driven to engage the necessary parties (scientists, stakeholders, policy makers) toward implementation of strategies to prevent or manage the impact of invasive species on U.S. agriculture."
In his nomination letter, Felton, a 2014 ESA Fellow, said that Hoover excels in research, teaching, and service. “There are three key attributes that stand out in Dr. Hoover's research contributions: interdisciplinary, collaborative, and integrative,” he wrote. “Hoover's program encompasses research, education, outreach and service related to the biology of and solutions for invasive species threats, in forest, ornamental, and agricultural systems. She integrates basic and applied research in multi-trophic interactions, microbial symbioses, invasion biology, and insect physiology.”
For 19 years, Hoover has collaborated with industrial engineers and national and international regulatory agencies “to develop a novel technology (patents pending) to reduce the risk of pathways that can introduce alien forest pests through international trade,” Felton wrote. “She has used her studies to create a platform for education and training of a diverse group of undergraduates, graduate students, and post-graduate scholars. Since Hoover's interdisciplinary approach allows her to interact with and serve as a bridge between multiple disciplines and diverse stakeholders, she has initiated broad networking opportunities for members of these communities by organizing and leading multi-disciplinary research teams, symposia, and international conferences.”
Asian Longhorned Beetle, Gypsy Moth
“The vast majority of Hoover's studies focuses on basic and applied research on invasive species, such as the Asian longhorned beetle (ALB) and gypsy moth and most recently the spotted lanternfly,” Felton wrote. “Hoover and collaborators investigated semiochemical communication in ALB in an effort to help regulatory agencies detect and monitor ALB in the field, especially at low densities. Hoover and colleagues took the male-produced volatile sex pheromone (discovered by USDA/ARS) and conducted years of basic lab and field research to produce a commercially available ALB lure (pheromones and kairomones) and trapping system, which primarily captures virgin females. The blend developed by Hoover and her team is sold by two major pheromone companies and has been used in North America, Germany, Britain, Switzerland and Italy. She and collaborators also characterized behavioral responses to a putative female-produced trail pheromone that elicits following behavior by males.”
Hoover is also heavily involved in preventing the introduction of invasive species. Her research draws support from governmental grant programs, commodity groups and the private sector. She is currently the principal investigator or co-PI on grants totaling $10 million, with $1.62 million directly supporting her program, Felton said, adding that she has actively collaborated with researchers in Europe, China, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia.
Felton described her as “an effective educator and mentor of the next generation of scientists.”
She has mentored 43 undergraduates, 11 PhD and 10 masters students, and 13 postdoctoral scholars, “many of whom have received prestigious awards and fellowships.”
High Impact Interdisciplinary Research
“While making new discoveries through basic research, she continues to strive to apply the outcomes of that research by actively engaging other scientists, stakeholder groups, and policymakers within Pennsylvania, nationally, and globally to make a difference -- to prevent and/or manage the consequences of invasive species on our ecosystems,” Felton wrote. “Her ability to conduct high impact interdisciplinary research and integrate transformational and translation research is truly outstanding.”
Born in Lubbock, Texas, but raised in the south San Francisco area,Kelli received her bachelor of science degree in 1979 from UC Berkeley, with honors, majoring in the biology of natural resources. She obtained her master's degree in biology, with an emphasis on entomology, from San Jose State University in 1992 before joining the doctoral program at UC Davis. After a year as a President's Postdoctoral Fellow at UC Berkeley, she joined the faculty in the Department of Entomology at PSU in 1998.
Active in ESA since 1996, Hoover has judged student competitions at 10 national meetings. She has organized numerous national or branch meeting symposia and served as a subject editor for Environmental Entomology. She chaired or co-chaired organizing committees for three annual meetings of the International Society for Invertebrate Pathology and held the office of treasurer for four years.
Fellows of ESA are individuals who have made outstanding contributions to entomology— via research, teaching, extension, administration, military service, and public engagement and science policy —and whose career accomplishments serve to inspire all entomologists, according to the ESA, a worldwide organization with a membership of some 7000.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
“This is the first paper documenting induction/stimulation of pollen germination by non-plants,” said Christensen, a doctoral candidate in the Microbiology Graduate Group who joined the Vannette lab in January 2019. “Nectar-dwelling Acinetobacter bacteria, commonly found in flowers, stimulate protein release by inducing pollen to germinate and burst, benefitting Acinetobacter.”
The article, “Nectar Bacteria Stimulate Pollen Germination and Bursting to Enhance Microbial Fitness,” is online July 28 and will be in print in the Oct. 11th edition of the journal Current Biology.
Christensen, who co-authored the paper with community ecologist and associate professor Vannette, and former Vannette lab member Ivan Munkres, collected California poppies, Eschscholzia californica, from the UC Davis Arboretum and Public Garden, and Acinetobacter primarily from the Stebbens Cold Canyon Reserve, a unit the UC Natural Reserve System that encompasses the Blue Ridge Berryessa Natural Area in Solano and Napa counties.
The question—“How do organisms actually eat pollen?”--has been a long-standing one, Vannette said, “because pollen is well-protected by a layers of very resistant biopolymers and it's unclear how pollen-eaters get through those protective layers.”
“The finding that bacteria--in this case a specific genus of bacteria-- can cause premature pollen germination and release of nutrients-- is cool for a number of reasons,” said Vannette, a UC Davis Hellman Fellow. “First, Shawn's results are very novel--no one has described this phenomenon before! Second, Acinetobacter is a genus of bacteria that are very common in flowers. They are usually among the most abundant bacteria in nectar and are often found on other floral tissues, including pollen, stigmas etc.”
Christensen, an evolutionary biologist turned microbiologist, studies Acinetobacter and other nectar microbes and their potential influences on pollen for nutrient procurement, as well as the metabolomics of solitary bee pollen provisions.
The UC Davis doctoral student is a recipient of two research awards: the Maurer-Timm Student Research Grant, a UC Davis award for research conducted in the Natural Reserves; and a Davis Botanical Society research award, specifically for this project.
Shawn holds a bachelor of science degree in evolutionary biology from University of Wisconsin-Madison. “I studied reducing ecological impacts of phosphorus runoff, ethnobotany and domestication traits in Brassica rapa, botanical field excursions of all kinds, the evolution of chemical sets in the early origins of life, and now plant-microbe-pollinator interactions."
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The honor is awarded to those scholars “whose work has been internationally recognized and acclaimed and whose teaching performance is excellent.”
The UC Davis Department of Entomology now has a total of nine distinguished professors: six current faculty--Bruce Hammock, Frank Zalom, Lynn Kimsey, James R. Carey, Jay Rosenheim, and Richard Karban--and three emeriti faculty--Harry Kaya, Howard Ferris and Thomas Scott. (In addition, emeritus professor/chair Robert E. Page Jr. is a UC Davis distinguished emeritus professor, as was the late Robbin Thorp, who died in 2019.)
Karban, whose research interests include the population regulation of animal species and the interactions between herbivores and their host plants, currently focuses his research on two main projects: volatile communication between sagebrush plants that affects resistance to herbivory and factors that control the abundance and spatial distribution of wooly bear caterpillars.
Karban has researched plant communication in sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) on the east side of the Sierra since 1995. His groundbreaking research on plant communication among kin, published in February 2013 in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, drew international attention. In that study, Karban and his co-researchers found that kin have distinct advantages when it comes to plant communication, just as “the ability of many animals to recognize kin has allowed them to evolve diverse cooperative behaviors.”
On his website, he explains his research on volatile communication: “When sagebrush is experimentally clipped, it releases volatile cues that undamaged branches on the same plant, on different sagebrush plants, and on some other plant species respond to. These volatile cues cause many changes in neighboring plants and some of these changes make the undamaged neighbors better defended against their herbivores. We currently know little about the nature of these cues.
“Blocking air contact between branches makes responses undetectable, indicating the involvement of airborne cues. Methyl jasmonate has the ability to serve as the signal although it remains unclear if it acts in this capacity in nature. I would like to understand the costs and benefits of releasing volatiles cues and of responding to them. I am examining the multiple consequences of emitting cues. For example, cues affect neighboring plants, nearby herbivores, as well as predators and parasites of those herbivores. I am currently examining the long-term fitness consequences for sagebrush of responding to volatile cues.”
On his research on the abundance and distribution of caterpillars, Karban writes: “Many workers define ecology as the science that explains the abundance and distribution of species. Despite a century of work on these questions, our field has only a rudimentary grasp on the factors that are important. I have been censusing populations of wooly bear caterpillars at Bodega Bay for 30 years and have relatively little understanding of the factors that produce patterns in abundance and distribution. The ‘usual suspects' all have relatively little explanatory power: weather, food limitation, and parasitoids all fail to provide much insight. Indeed, caterpillars often recover from the attacks of their tachinid parasitoids and alter their diets when parasitized to increase their chances of surviving. Including a more complete food web in our analysis does not appear to provide more resolution although ants may be unappreciated as predators and food quality may also be important. I am collaborating with Perry de Valpine to attempt to develop new analytical techniques that will account for more of the variance in abundance data. I am collaborating as well with Marcel Holyoak to examine spatial patterns of abundance.”
Karban is the author of landmark book, Plant Sensing and Communication. He is a fellow of the Ecological Society of America (ESA) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the recipient of the 1990 George Mercer Award from ESA for outstanding research.
The UC Davis ecologist is featured in the Dec. 23-30, 2013 edition of The New Yorker in Michael Pollan's piece, The Intelligent Plant: Scientists Debate a New Way of Understanding Plants. Zoe Schlanger featured him in a Nov. 21, 2020 Bloomberg Quint article titled The Botanist Daring to Ask: Do Plants Have Personalities?
Karban received his bachelor's degree in environmental studies from Haverford (Penn.) College in 1977 and his doctorate in biology from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, in 1982. He served as a lecturer at Haverford College for six months before joining the UC Davis faculty in May 1982 as an assistant professor. He advanced to associate professor in 1988 and to full professor in 1994.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Niño, known internationally for her expertise on honey bee queen biology, chemical ecology, and genomics, joined the faculty in September of 2014 and maintains laboratories and offices in Briggs Hall and at the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility.
Niño serves as the director of the California Master Beekeeper Program (CAMBP), which she launched in 2016. The California Master Beekeeper Program is a continuous train-the-trainer effort. CAMBP's vision is to train beekeepers to effectively communicate the importance of honey bees and other pollinators within their communities, serve as mentors for other beekeepers, and become the informational conduit between the beekeeping communities throughout the state and UCCE staff.
Niño is also the faculty director of the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven, the department's half-acre educational bee garden located next to the Laidlaw facility, which serves as the outdoor classroom for the Pollinator Education Program, lovingly known as PEP.
“My research interests are fluid and designed to address immediate needs of various agriculture stakeholder groups,” she writes on her website. “Projects encompass both basic and applied approaches to understanding and improving honey bee health and particularly honey bee queen health. Ongoing research projects include understanding queen mating and reproductive processes, discovery and evaluation of novel biopesticides for efficacy against varroa mites, and evaluating orchard management practices with a goal of improving honey bee health. Some of our more fun projects revolve around precision beekeeping and investigate the use of cutting edge technologies to make beekeeping more efficient and sustainable.”
Niño says she “greatly enjoys working with the community and especially with children. To ensure that our future researchers, agriculture leaders and innovators and future voters understand the importance of honey bees and other pollinators to our agroecosystems.”
“Our Pollinator Education Program at the Häagen Dazs Honey Bee Haven garden has been working with the Farms of Amador County to serve third grade students and we are planning on expanding our efforts in the near future and as the pandemic hopefully resolves.”
Niño received her bachelor's degree in animal science from Cornell University in 2003; her master's degree in entomology at North Carolina State University in 2006; and her doctorate at Pennsylvania State University (PSU) in 2012. She served as a postdoctoral fellow, funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (USDA-NIFA), as a member of the PSU Center for Pollinator Research.
Niño has a varied entomology background. While working on her bachelor's degree at Cornell, she was involved in studies on darkling beetle control in poultry houses, pan-trapped horse flies, and surveyed mosquitoes in New York state. While working toward her master's degree at North Carolina State University, she studied dung beetle nutrient cycling and its effect on grass growth, effects of methoprene (insect grown regular) on dung beetles in field and laboratory settings, and assisted in a workshop on forensic entomology.