- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
That's the title of the next UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology seminar, to be presented Wednesday, Jan. 27 by assistant professor Charissa de Bekker of the University of Central Florida (UCF). The virtual seminar begins qt 4:10 p.m. Access this Google form link to join the seminar on Zoom.
"My lab studies parasites that change the behavior of their hosts," she writes on her website. "Nature harbors quite some bizarre examples of parasites that evolved the ability manipulate. These manipulations range from slightly altered existing behaviors to the establishment of completely novel ones that are not part of the host's regular repertoire."
"One of the most dramatic examples of the latter is that of the zombie ants. Here, a fungal parasite takes control of the behavior of a Carpenter ant, guiding it up the vegetation where it latches on in a final death grip. Working across various disciplines within the broad field of biology we use this parasite-host interaction as a model system to ask the question how a microbe can control an animal's brain to change the behavioral output so precisely. In addition, we know very little about how behavior in general is regulated. Our research will therefore not only inform us about the mechanisms that these parasites use to manipulate their hosts, but ultimately also give an important insight into the regulation of behavior in general."
De Bekker holds a five-year $970,000 National Science Foundation grant to study "parasitic fungi that hijack behaviors of their hosts."
A member of the UCF faculty since 2016, she received three degrees in biology from Utrecht University, The Netherlands: her bachelor's degree in 2004; her master's degree in 2006, and her doctorate in 2011. She specialized in molecular microbiology. She did postdoctoral research at the Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics, Department of Entomology, The Pennsylvania State University, from April 2011 to July 2012, and then served as a postdoctoral Marie Curie Fellow and Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow at Ludwig-Maximilians University, Munich, Germany, before joining UCF. (See lab website)
Agricultural Extension specialist Ian Grettenberger of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology is coordinating the weekly seminars. He may be reached at imgrettenberger@ucdavis.edu
Media Coverage of Zombie Ant Research (Partial List):
- Five-Year Grant Will Deepen Research Into ‘Zombie Ants' (COS News, Feb. 26, 2020)
- The Science Behind Zombie Ants (UCF Today, Oct. 21, 2019)
- How a Parasitic Fungus Turns Ants Into 'Zombies' (National Geographic, April 18, 2019)
- The Science of Zombies: Will the Undead Rise? (Phys.Org, Nov. 1, 2019
Read National Public Radio's coverage of Zombie research (Oct. 31, 2019).
Further reading: How the Zombie Fungus Takes Over Ants' Bodies to Control Their Minds (The Atlantic, Nov. 14, 2017
See UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology website for list of other seminar speakers for the winter quarter
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The seminar takes place from 4:10 to 5 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 28. Access this site for the Zoom link. Host is Cooperative Extension specialist and agricultural entomologist Ian Grettenberger, assistant professor, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology. He is coordinating the department's fall seminars.
"The research in our lab focuses on understanding how chemical compounds mediate interactions among microbes, plants, herbivores, and herbivore natural enemies," Helms says. "We combine analytical chemistry and behavioral ecology in laboratory and field-based research to investigate how organisms use chemistry to navigate, communicate, and defend themselves. This seminar will discuss some of our ongoing projects examining how plants and insect herbivores use chemical information from their environment to assess their risk of attack and how herbivore natural enemies use such information to find potential prey."
Helms, an assistant professor, holds two degrees from Pepperdine University, Malibu, Calif., both awarded in 2009: a bachelor of science degree in biology and a bachelor of arts degree in biochemistry. She received her doctorate in ecology in 2015 from The Pennsylvania State University, State College, Penn. While in the John Tooker lab, Helms studied the chemical ecology of plant-insect interactions, especially how plants defend themselves against insect herbivores. She investigated how plants use olfactory cues to predict impeding herbivore attacks and the molecular mechanisms involved.
In addition to the general field of chemical ecology, Helms' research interests include plant-insect interactions, tritrophic interactions, belowground chemical ecology, chemical communication, and plant defense.
Her most recent publications:
Helms, A.M., Ray, S., Matulis, N.L.*, Kuzemchak, M.C.*, Grisales, W.*, Tooker, J.F., Ali, J.G. Chemical cues linked to risk: Cues from belowground natural enemies enhance plant defences and influence herbivore behaviour and performance. Functional Ecology. 33, 798-808 (2019). DOI: 10.1111/1365-2435.13297
Acevedo, F.E., Smith, P., Peiffer, M., Helms, A.M., Tooker, J.T., Felton, G.W. Phytohormones in fall armyworm saliva modulate defense responses in plants. Journal of Chemical Ecology. (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10886-019-01079-z
Yip, E.C., Sowers, R.P.*, Helms, A.M., Mescher, M.C., De Moraes, C.M., Tooker, J.F. Tradeoffs between defenses against herbivores in goldenrod (Solidago altissima). Arthropod-Plant Interactions. 13, 279-287 (2019). DOI: 10.1007/s11829-019-09674-3
For any technical issues regarding the seminar, contact Grettenberger at imgrettenberger@ucdavis.edu.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Global change ecologist Amanda Koltz, a senior scientist with the Department of Biology, Washington University, St. Louis, will speak on "Species Interactions and Ecosystems in a Changing World" at the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology's virtual seminar at 4:10 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 14.
"Biological communities and species interactions are changing rapidly as a result of global change," she says in her abstract. "These changes are likely to have cascading effects on ecosystems, but we still have limited understanding of the extent to which organismal responses to global change may also drive ecosystem responses to it. In this talk, I will present some of my work on the potential feedbacks between global change, communities, and ecosystem functioning from two different study systems. First, I will discuss how warming can alter the cascading effects of spiders in the Arctic tundra, and then I will discuss my recent efforts at characterizing the potential consequences of shifting interactions among ruminant hosts and their parasites. The common theme throughout the talk will be the importance of considering species interactions in efforts to understand ecosystem responses to global change."
Koltz describes herself as a "global change ecologist interested in how species interactions influence community composition and ecosystem function in the context of environmental change. I use common, widespread organisms that are sensitive to change-- like wolf spiders, mosquitoes and gut worms--to better understand how the animals in our everyday lives impact the ecosystems we live in. My recent work focuses on two fundamental questions: (1) How do biological communities respond to changes in the environment? and (2) What are the consequences of changes in species interactions for the cycling of energy and nutrients within ecosystems?"
Cooperative Extension specialist and agricultural entomologist Ian Grettenberger, assistant professor, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, coordinates the fall series of virtual seminars. They are held on Wednesdays at 4:10 p.m.
Host for the Koltz seminar is Emily Meineke, assistant professor of urban landscape entomology, who researches insect-plant interactions.
Grettenberger announced that this is the form to obtain the zoom link:
https://docs.google.com/forms/
Koltz's research has appeared in a number of recent publications:
- Small but Mighty: Measuring Parasites' Footprints
- Wolf Spiders May Turn to Cannibalism in a Warming Arctic
- Warming Alters Predator-Prey Interactions in the Arctic
- Bugged Out by Climate Change
- Higher Education Channel: Arctic Wolf Spider's Changing Diet May Help Keep Arctic Cool & Lessen Some Impact of Global Warming
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
"Insect wings are flexible, dynamic living structures that are composed of long tubular veins, and thin membrane," she says in her abstract. "Veins act as conduits, containing hemolymph (insect blood), oxygen supply (through trachea tubes), and nerves (sensory information in flight). Wings allow an insect to perform a myriad of behaviors such as predation, migration and pollination."
"In my research, I work to understand how wing health and function is maintained, and how that relates to insect development, behavior, and ecosystem. My research program incorporates foundational physiology (wing vein structure, venation pattern active systems) quantifying the biomechanics of flow produced by an insect (circulation, wing expansion, flapping flight), and determining how agricultural practices affect insect health. Here I will discuss how venation pattern affects circulation dynamics in the wings of the North American grasshopper (Schistocerca americana) and how it barely scratches the surface of understanding circulation in insects."
In a First Person piece in Biology Open, the Company of Biologists, Salcedo describes herself as "an insect biomechanist, but perhaps functional morphologist is more accurate. I've studied how insects fly, how their muscles move, how they breathe and circulate hemolymph. My PhD looked into their wing structure at several levels: external, internal and global. Externally, I looked at how wing shapes differ between species and how we might compare them. Within the insect wing vein, I studied how hemolymph is transported across the wing. Overall, I looked at how an insect's multiple hearts contribute to internal circulation."
Salcedo, who received a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Research Fellowship to investigate fundamental insect physiology, holds three degrees: a bachelor of science in applied and computational math sciences (2012( from the University of Washington; a bachelor of science in molecular, cellular and developmental biology (2012) from the University of Washington, and a doctorate in biomechanics, biology and applied math (2018) from Harvard.
Coordinating the seminars is community ecologist Rachel Vannette, assistant professor, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology (rlvannette@ucdavis.edu). To access the program live, go to https://zoom.us/j/559909612 and enter meeting ID: 559 909 612.
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Meeting ID: 559 909 612