- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Agrawal, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at Cornell with a joint appointment in the Department of Entomology, will deliver the Founders’ Memorial Award lecture at the ESA’s 61st annual meeting set Nov. 10-13 in Austin, Texas.
The recipient of this annual award addresses the conferees to honor the memory and career of an outstanding entomologist. Agrawal has selected Dame Miriam Rothschild (1908-2005), best known for her work with mimicry, and a pioneer in the area of insect chemical ecology.
Agrawal researches plant-insect interactions, including aspects of herbivory, community ecology, phenotypic plasticity, chemical ecology and coevolution. Research projects include work on local biodiversity, ecology of invasive plants, the biology of Monarch butterflies, and the evolution of plant defense strategies.
From the ESA site:
"Dr. Agrawal’s research accomplishments cover the key areas of arthropod community genetics, real-time evolution of plant defense against insects, phylogenetic ecology, plant neighborhood-insect interactions, and insect colonization and induced defense. Over the course of his career to date, he has published more than 100 peer-reviewed papers in high-profile journals such as PNAS, Science, and Nature, and he has edited two key books on insect ecology."
"In the relatively new area of arthropod community genetics, he has addressed natural selection on milkweed defensive traits and how plant genetic variation in these traits influences insect community structure and coexistence. In the area of real time evolution of plant defenses against insects, he has shown that the suppression of insect damage causes the evolution of decreased plant resistance and increased competitive ability. His work in the area of phylogenetic ecology uses a comparative biology approach to address problems ranging from the controls on the success of invasive species to phylogenetic signatures of coevolution. And in the area of plant neighborhood-insect interactions, his ongoing research seeks to partition the relative importance of direct, associational, and trait-mediated effects of competing plants on milkweed and its insect fauna."
Rothschild, a British natural scientist and a leading authority on fleas. authored a book on parasitism, Fleas, Flukes and Cuckoos. Her father was entomologist Charles Rothschild, whose collection of fleas is in the Rothschild Collection at the British Museum.
"She is best known for her work with mimicry, and she conducted classic studies on the role of carotenoids in insect mimicry," according to information posted on the ESA website. "In addition to her work cataloging the famous Rothschild flea collection, Dame Rothschild was also a pioneer in the area of insect chemical ecology. Her work in particular on mimicry and sequestration of toxic compounds by insects was outstanding. Nature conservation was extremely important to her, and she lobbied strongly in favor of nature reserves."
Agrawal was at UC Davis in January of 2012 to deliver a seminar on "Evolutionary Ecology of Plant Defenses." His abstract: "In order to address coevolutionary interactions between milkweeds and their root feeding four-eyed beetles, I will present data on reciprocity, fitness tradeoffs, specialization and the genetics of adaptation. In addition to wonderful natural history, this work sheds light on long-standing theory about how antagonistic interactions proceed in ecological and evolutionary time."
Nearly 3,000 entomologists are expected to attend Entomology 2013. ESA, which has some 6500 members, is the world's largest organization serving the professional and scientific needs of entomologists and people in related disciplines. It was founded in 1889.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The UC Davis Department of Entomology has been renamed the Department of Entomology and Nematology.
Carolyn de la Pena, UC Davis interim vice provost for undergraduate education, relayed the message May 28 to interim dean Mary Delany of the UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.
The faculty of the Department of Entomology and Department of Nematology had earlier proposed the consolidation of the two departments in response to a recommendation by the College for the elimination of the Department of Nematology. In the interim following consolidation, the name, “UC Davis Department of Entomology,” was used until university administrators approved the new name.
Of the 27 faculty members in the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, five are nematologists.
Michael Parrella, professor of entomology, serves as the department chair, and nematologist Edwin Lewis, professor of both entomology and nematology and former interim chair of the UC Davis Department of Nematology, is the department’s vice chair. Professor Steve Nadler served as the last chair of the Department of Nematology.
Said Nadler: “Since approval of the consolidation of our departments nearly two years ago, our nematologists and entomologists have been working together and finding common ground to build upon prior successes. As the state economy improves and the university grows, I believe our newly named department will be successful in adding faculty positions that rebuild core research areas that were lost through faculty retirements.”
The UC Davis Department of Entomology began as an offshoot of the UC Berkeley Department of Entomology, while the UC Davis nematologists were closely linked with UC Riverside nematologists.
The UC Davis Department of Entomology traces its roots back to Oct. 30 1907 when UC Berkeley professor C. W. Woodworth spoke to the State Farmers' Institute in Davisville (now Davis) on the "Whitefly Situation in California." This was a forerunner to the Farmers' Short Courses (three-to-six-week courses) launched in the fall of 1908.
UC Davis established a two-year non-degree program in entomology in 1913 and its first degree in entomology in 1923-24 when Stanley Freeborn moved from Berkeley to Davis to head up this new and expanding program. The Davis campus began its administrative independence from Berkeley under Provost Freeborn (later chancellor) in 1952. R. M. Bohart became vice chair of the UC Davis Department of Entomology in 1957, and the following year, the College of Agriculture instituted the rotating-chair system. In the spring of 1960, entomology settled into its new quarters in Robbins Hall, and in 1971, moved into the newly built Briggs Hall, intended for biological sciences faculty and staff.
The history of the UC Davis Department of Nematology began in 1954 with the establishment of the Statewide Department of Plant Nematology, comprised of the UC Riverside and UC Davis nematologists. The University of California was the first academic institution to recognize nematology as a field of science separate from plant pathology, entomology or parasitology.
In 1962, research competency at the two sites broadened sufficiently for the university to approve of a name change from the Statewide Department of Plant Nematology to the Department of Nematology. In 1962, J. D. Radewald was appointed as a Cooperative Extension Specialist at UC Riverside. In 1965, statewide University administration embarked on a decentralization program, giving the individual campuses greater autonomy.
From 1965 onwards, the two nematology departments evolved independently. In 1969, D. E. Johnson was appointed as a Cooperative Extension Specialist at the San Joaquin Valley Research and Extension Center at Parlier.
UC Davis entomology and nematology faculty have received worldwide recognition for their research, teaching and public service.
The Chronicle of Higher Education, considered the top news and job-information source for college and university faculty members, administrators, and students, ranked the UC Davis Department of Entomology as the No. 1 in the country in 2007. Factors considered were remarkable performances in faculty scholarly productivity, scientific citations per faculty, percentage of faculty with a journal publication, number of journal publications per faculty, and grantsmanship, among other factors. (The rankings have not been updated since 2007.)
UC Davis is No. 1 in the world for teaching and research in the area of agriculture and forestry, according to rankings released this year by QS World University Rankings.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
He will be honored at the consortium’s annual spring reception, set from 4:10 to 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 15in the Recreation Pool Lodge. Others honored will be Cecilia Colombi, Department of Spanish and Portuguese; Diana Davis, Department of History; Annaliese Franz, Department of Chemistry; and Archana Venkatesan, Department of Comparative literature and religious studies.
The outstanding mentor award provides “recognition and research money to faculty who have been outstanding in the mentoring of women graduate students and postdocs at UC Davis,” according to consortium director/sociology professor Laura Grindstaff.
Zalom was nominated by his graduate student Kelly Hamby, a doctoral candidate in entomology; colleague and research collaborator James Grieshop, Cooperative Extension specialist emeritus, Department of Human and Community Development; graduate student researcher Jennifer Sedell, Community Development and Geography Graduate Groups; and postdoctoral researcher Margareta Lelea, Department of Entomology, and Department of Human and Community Development.
Also supporting his nomination was Hillary Thomas of the California Strawberry Commission, who received her doctorate at UC Davis with Zalom as her major professor.
In her nomination letter, Hamby wrote that Zalom has served as a major professor for 11 doctoral students and six master’s degree students. “However, that does not even begin to enumerate the students whose lives he’s changed. His office is always open to students, whether they are undergraduates or graduates, his own students or someone else’s.”
Noting that women are showing an increased interest in entomology, Hamby pointed out that the number of women in the Entomological Society of America (ESA) has jumped from less than two percent membership in 1957 to 19 percent in 2011. Zalom is the elected vice president of 6000-member ESA and will serve as president in 2014.
“Frank strongly encourages women to be agricultural entomologists,” Hamby wrote. “Including myself, at least eight of his 11 Ph.D. students have been women. Not only does he encourage his students to excel in a field that is male dominated, but also to take academic positions, such as entomology faculty jobs, that continue to be male dominated today. Entomology programs average less than 15 percent female faculty and some of Frank’s best students have been the first female faculty in their departments.”
Under his mentorship, Hamby helped write five research grants, of which three were funded. He also helped her with networking and connections. She was invited to give three professional talks this year including a talk at the International Congress of Entomology in Daegu, South Korea.
Her research combines genomic and molecular biology techniques, fields that traditionally considered to be basic science with more traditional IPM. Zalom sought, and found, collaborators to help mentor her.
“Not only does Frank provide mentorship for me, but he encourages me to develop leadership and managerial skills by mentoring others,” Hamby wrote. “He encouraged me to interview and hire undergraduate students to help with my research and has allowed me to mentor them as young scientists.”
“Frank is an exceptional mentor because he genuinely cares about students,” Hamby said. “He considers his job to be like parenting, and accepting a new graduate student is accepting a new son or daughter. His mentorship does not end with the conferral of a degree. He stays in contact with all of his students, regardless of where their careers take them…he will make time to help them with whatever problem they are facing.”
“Frank has given me the courage and skills to attempt to become a faculty member in agricultural entomology, despite the challenges faced by my gender and the tough economic times,” Hamby said.
Grieshop, a retired Cooperative Extenson specialist in community education and a collaborator with Zalom for more than two decades, is currently working on a USDA-funded project with Zalom and Lelea and Sedell. The program targets two new moth species in California.
Zalom has “demonstrated excellent and consistent mentoring behaviors in a very challenging cross-disciplinary project,” Grieshop said, adding that Zalom’s interactions and relationships with graduate students and post-doctoral scholars have always been supportive, encouraging and extremely collaborative.”
His researchers “speak positively of his support, encouragement, openness to ideas and fairness,” Grieshop said. For example, Zalom encouraged Lelea and Sedell to present their preliminary findings to USDA personnel; to present their work at conferences; and to produce research papers beyond the project report.
“During our biweekly meetings, it is common to hear Dr. Zalom encourage them to go beyond the final report and even to offer support to do so,” Grieshop said. “All of these behaviors reflect Dr. Zalom’s commitment to these scholars and their futures in academia.”
Lelea praised Zalom’s “openness to new perspectives, respect for the skills and talents that each of us bring to the program, and eagerness to steadfastly support emerging scholars such as Jen Sedell and myself who are human geographers and many other graduate students and post-docs who are the new women leaders in the field of entomology.”
“As a mentor, he encourages us to believe in ourselves and set goals to publish, apply for grants and jobs, and to make connections,” Lelea wrote.
Lelea noted that one facet of her research involves the controversial spraying for light brown apple moth. “Many of the community activists that I interviewed expressed appreciation for the courage of Frank and others from UC Davis who testified at California State Senate hearings that the eradication goal of the spray program was scientifically untenable (further confirmed by a later National Academy of Sciences report).”
“One woman I interviewed said, ‘You have probably heard this from others, but UC Davis was absolutely astonishing for us. I mean the fact that Frank Zalom, and Jim Carey were able to stand up and question the program and say, wait a minute, look at this and look at that, was absolutely vital.’ ”
Sedell, seeking her master’s degree in community and regional development, lauded Zalom’s “outstanding mentorship and support to me as a graduate student, but he has also shown me how working across the biophysical and social sciences can produce meaningful and fruitful research.” He treats his graduate and post-doc researchers as “professionals who bring critical insight into the work at hand.”
“He is as excited to learn from students as we are from him,” Sedell wrote. “That sincerity, in respect, encouragement and engagement he offers students is his most marked trait.”
Zalom has “not only provided outstanding mentorship and support to me as a graduate student, but he has also shown me how working across the biophysical and social sciences can produce meaningful and fruitful research,” Sedell related.
Zalom, who received his doctorate in entomology from UC Davis in 1978, has served as a professor, entomologist in the Agricultural Experiment Station, and Extension entomologist with the UC Davis Department of Entomology since 1980. He directed the UC Statewide IPM Program from 1986 to 2002.
His IPM leadership includes: co-chair of the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities (APLU) National IPM Committee since 1999, IPM representative to the APLU Science and Technology Committee since 2003, and USDA Western Region IPM Competitive Grants Program manager since 2004. He served on the USAID (U.S. Agency for International Development) Board of Directors for the IPM CRSP (Collaborative Research Support Program) from 2001-05.
Zalom is a Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences (1990), the ESA (2008), and American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) (2010). He received a Fulbright Senior Research Scholarship (1992-93), the ESA Achievement Award in Extension (1992), the ESA Recognition Award (2002), the James H. Meyer Award from UC Davis for teaching, research and service (2004), the Entomological Foundation IPM Team Award (2008) and its Excellence in IPM Award (2010). He was the 2011 recipient of the C.W. Woodworth Award from the Pacific Branch. In addition, he served as Pacific Branch president (2001). Zalom has authored approximately 300 peer- reviewed journal articles, book chapters and books, including Food, Crop Pests, and the Environments published by the American Phytopathological Society Press.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Host is Michael Parrella, professor and chair of the UC Davis Department of Entomology. The seminar will be videotaped for later viewing on UCTV Seminars.
Of his talk on chemical ecology in aphid-plant-virus pathosystems, Eigenbrode says: “Most plant viruses depend upon vectors for their transmission, thereby coupling their epidemiology, and their ecological and evolutionary success, to the behavior and performance of their vector species. Evidence is accumulating that plant viruses influence the biology and behavior of their vectors such their transmission is enhanced.”
“Our work with luteoviruses is a part of this evidence. Specifically, volatile emissions from virus-infected plants are attractant or arrestant to aphid vectors in 6 pathosystems involving luteoviruses. Furthermore, dynamics of some of these responses with disease progression, age of inoculation and infectious status of the vector also potentially contribute to increased virus transmission. A literature review suggests that plant virus effects on vector biology and behavior differs with mode of virus transmission (nonpersistent, persistent but non replicating, persistent and replicating within the vector). Implications for further study and for application will be presented.”
Eigenbrode focuses his research on chemical ecology of insect-plant and multi-trophic interactions. This has included an emphasis on the chemical ecology, landscape ecology and management of insect-vectored viruses of wheat, potatoes and legumes in the Pacific Northwest. The regional scope of this work has led to substantial interdisciplinary effort addressing the sustainability of agricultural systems. He is project director for a $20 million USDA National Institute for Food and Agriculture (IFA) Coordinated Agricultural Project on Regional Approaches to Climate Change in Pacific Northwest Agriculture. He has been a co-principal investigator on two National Science Foundation Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship Program (NSF-IGERT) projects, one ongoing, studying resilience of ecological and social systems in changing landscapes, which includes extensive collaboration with the Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center in Costa Rica.
Eigenbrode is engaged in research in collaboration with philosophers and sociologists focused on improving the process of collaborative science. In 2013, he was named University Distinguished Professor at the University of Idaho.
Eigenbrode received degrees in natural resources (M.S., 1986) and Entomology (Ph.D., 1990) from Cornell University.
Related Links:
http://www.cals.uidaho.edu/aphidtracker/index.asp
https://www.reacchpna.org
http://www.cals.uidaho.edu/toolbox/
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The seminar is from 12:05 to 1 p.m. in Room 1022 of the Life Sciences Addition, corner of Hutchison and Kleiber Hall drives. Professor Frank Zalom and Ph.D candidate Kelly Hamby of the Zalom lab are the hosts.
Plans call for recording the seminar for later posting on the UCTV Seminar series.
Aldrich will describe the history of the discovery of the Brown Marmorated Stink Bug (BMSB) in Allentown, Penn,. in 2000, and its subsequent spread and damage in North America. He will detail the discovery of the bug's chemical communication system and ongoing pheromone commercialization efforts. He then will present results of laboratory experiments using native egg parasitoids exposed to the stink bug eggs.
An expert on BMSB, Aldrich established that BMSB in the U.S. is cross-attracted to the pheromone of a congeneric species; he facilitated commercialization of this cross-attractant lure; and he led the team that identified the pheromone of the BMSB. The significance: Aldrich created the basis for monitoring the spread of BMSB, a major agricultural pest that causes vegetables and fruit to rot (USDA has estimated $21 billion worth of crops are at risk). BMSB is also a pervasive residential nuisance. The research is potentially useful in systems to mass trap and/or attract-and-kill BMSB.
In other work, Aldrich pioneered the discovery/application of general predator pheromones to enhance biocontrol: for example, he identified the male-produced aggregation pheromone of the spined soldier bug, and patented the invention, which Sterling International commercialized. He also discovered a similar system in green lacewings that awaits development. The significance: he established the concept that using male-produced aggregation pheromones to induce females to lay eggs in pest infestations can create armies of predator offspring that must search for prey in the area. This pheromone market is defined by the number of prey species the predator attracts, thus increasing the likelihood of commercialization.
A member of the Entomological Society of America since 1972, Aldrich is a past president of both the International Society of Chemical Ecology and the Entomological Society of Washington, D.C., and was appointed associate editor of the Journal of Chemical Ecology in 2009.
Aldrich served as a research entomologist for the U.S. Department of Agricultural Research Service, Beltsville, MD, from 1980 to 2011, including five years as a laboratory research leader (1999-2004).
His other research experience includes:
- 1990-2010, visiting scientist annually in government and academic laboratories in Brazil for up to four months at a time.
- 1991 and 2007, visiting scientist, Queensland Department of Primary Industries, Australia, six months and five weeks, respectively.
- 1996, visiting scientist, Ministry of Agriculture, Tsukuba, Japan, six weeks.
- 1994, visiting scientist, Perugia University, Italy, three months.
- 1978-1980, research associate, New York State Agricultural Experiment Station, Geneva, N.Y.
- 1977-1978, Rockefeller Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Georgia, Athens, Ga.
- 1975, Tropical Ecology Field Course, Organization for Tropical Studies, Costa Rica, two months.
Aldrich has published his work in journals including Science, Journal of Chemical Ecology, Chemoecology, and Environmental Entomology. He has presented more than 150 lectures at national and international venues, including technical organizations, universities, government agencies, and lay groups.
The New York Times, Washington Post, Baltimore Sun, Discovery, U.S. News and World Report, and Organic Gardener have covered his work. In addition, he has been interviewed by a number of radio and TV stations in the United States and Brazil.