- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
(Editor's Note: Karl Kjer is no longer with UC Davis)
Molecular phylogeneticist Karl Kjer, the Schlinger Chair in Insect Systematics in the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, is the recipient of the 2016 Hodson Alumni Award, awarded annually by the University of Minnesota's Department of Entomology to a distinguished alumnus.
Kjer, who received two degrees from the University of Minnesota—his master's in 1988 and his doctorate in 1992--accepted the award from Stephen Kells, associate professor and chair of the department, and his close collaborator, professor Ralph Holzenthal, director of the Insect Museum. The award, established in 1998, memorializes Alexander Hodson, a former department chair.
Kjer delivered the University of Minnesota presentation on “Integrating Large Datasets, from Transcriptomes to Barcodes in Today's Phylogenetics" on May 18.
Kjer, who joined the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology last July following an 18-year career at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, N.J., is a co-founder of an international insect phylogentics team known as the 1000 Insect Transcription Evolution Project (1KITE). The project involved creating a database of transcriptomes or all the genes expressed in an insect at the time it is collected. The team developed state-of-the-art methods to analyze genetic data from the DNA of modern insects, and calibrate DNA “clocks” with fossil records. They then used massive super computers to estimate the pattern, and timing of insect evolution.
Kjer presented one of the 20 “Premier Presentations” at the 2015 Entomological Society of America (ESA) meeting last November in Minneapolis. (Watch YouTube video.) He presented a plenary lecture at the Barcode of Life meetings in Guelph Ontario as his first task after arriving in Davis last fall. (Watch YouTube video.)
“By necessity, the project was split into three phases, the first of which, involving the analysis of 1478 genes from 144 species, has been published,” Kjer wrote in his ESA abstract. He discussed the phylogenetic results from this paper. The second phase of the work involved dividing insects into taxonomic divisions, or subprojects, which include dragonflies, grasshoppers and their close relatives, mantids and roaches, true bugs and lice, bees, wasps and ants, beetles, lacewings and their close relatives, flies, caddisflies, and butterflies and moths. These subprojects include data from 1500 species, and 3500-4900 genes. He discussed the progress on the subprojects.
The research project reveals that insects originated some 450 million years ago, around the same time as the first plants and that together they shaped the Earth's earliest ecosystem. Insects, such as dragonflies and damselflies, inhabited the earth 150 million years before dinosaurs.
The 100-member research team from 10 countries also discovered that insects first took flight 400 million years ago and were flying 200 million years before any other animal did so.
Their work was featured in a cover story, Nov. 7, 2014, of Science.
"Insects did just about everything first," according to Kjer. "They were the first to form social societies, farm, and sing — just about anything you can imagine. Insects are the dominant players in almost all terrestrial ecosytems, and as such, they have a major impact on agriculture and human health.”
Kjer has served as the associate editor of Systematic Biology since 2001. A member of the Society of Systemic Biologists and the Molecular Biology and Evolution Society since 1994 and ESA in 1986, he was elected from 2008 to 2012 to the Systemic Biology Council.
Kjer recalled that as a youth, he narrowed his career choices to three: entomologist, medical doctor or music teacher. He then double-majored in biology and music, graduating magna cum laude, in 1982 from Concordia College, Moorhead, Minn. He taught music at a high school in Coon Rapids, Minn., for a year and then worked as a medical research lab technician in at the University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics, Iowa City, until 1986.
After receiving his graduate degrees in entomology from the University of Minnesota, Kjer did postdoctoral work on lizards at Brigham Young University in Utah, before joining the faculty of Rutgers University, New Brunswick, N.J., where he served as a professor of ecology, evolution and natural resources and as a co-director of 1KITE. He also curated the Rutgers' insect collection.
At UC Davis, Kjer continues his teaching and research on phylogenetics and the integration of molecular biology and organismal biology. “I just love teaching and learning about insects,” he said. “I have been fascinated with them for as long as I can remember, and want to share this passion with our students at UC Davis. I believe that understanding evolution makes life richer.”
Kjer is the second UC Davis faculty member to receive the Hodson Alumni Award. Extension apiculturist Eric Mussen, now emeritus, received the award in 2013.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
When honey bee guru Eric Mussen, Extension apiculturist and member of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology faculty since 1976, received the Alexander Hodson Graduate Alumni Award from his alma mater, the University of Minnesota, he was praised as an outstanding apiculturist who does the university--and the nation--proud.
He was also roasted. Colleague Mark Epstein, senior insect biosystematist at the California Department of Food and Agriculture, managed to obtain footage of Mussen singing doo-wop—off-key. The crowd roared.
So did Mussen.
Mussen sings doo wop as a member of a Davis Art Center-based group led by Frank Fox. “We were joking around at the end of a song, ‘Looking for an Echo,’ and we crashed,” Mussen acknowledged.
William Hutchison, professor and head of the Department of Entomology at the University of Minnesota, presented Mussen with the award. The award memorializes Alexander C. Hodson, Department Head from 1960-1974 who died in 1996. The Hodson Graduate Alumni Award was established in 1998 to recognize and honor outstanding alumni of the Department of Entomology.
Mussen was nominated by former recipient Marla Spivak, Distinguished McKnight University Professor of Apiculture and 2010 MacArthur Fellow, and Gary Reuter, apiculture technician, both with the University of Minnesota. Faculty and staff from UC Davis contributed to the nomination package.
While visiting the University of Minnoesta, Mussen met with faculty members Spivak, Timothy Kurtti and Vera Kirchek and their students. Professor Kurtii is working on the permanent honey bee cell culture line. Kirchek, an associate professor and urban forester, is conducting research on the residue of neonicotinoids, a class of neuro-active insecticides recently banned by the European Commission as being harmful to honey bees.
A native of Schenectady, N.Y., Mussen received his bachelor’s degree in entomology from the University of Massachusetts (after turning down an offer to play football at Harvard) and then received his master’s degree and doctorate in entomology from the University of Minnesota in 1969 and 1975, respectively.
His doctoral research focused on the epidemiology of a viral disease of larval honey bees, sacbrood virus. "During those studies I also was involved in studies concerning sunflower pollination and control of a microsporidian parasite of honey bees, Nosema apis," Mussen recalled. "Now a new species of Nosema has displaced N. apis and is even more difficult to keep subdued."
“Given this foundation, he was confronted with many new challenges regarding honey bee health and pollination concerns when he arrived at UC Davis in 1976,” said Hutchison. “Some 37 years later, he is still actively ‘tackling’ these new challenges--mites, diseases, and Africanized honey bees, to name a few--to enhance the pollination success of California's diverse agricultural cropping systems, with considerable emphasis on almonds. In brief, he is in demand, and he continues to be the primary source for objective information on honey bee health, and pollination in California.”
"I am basically all pro-bee,” Mussen told the American Bee Journal in a two-part feature story published in the September of 2011. “Whatever I can do for bees, I do it...It doesn’t matter whether there is one hive in the backyard or 15,000 colonies. Bees are bees and the bees’ needs are the bees’ needs.”
Mussen, who plans to retire from UC Davis in June 2014, credits his grandfather with sparking his interest in insects. His grandfather, a self-taught naturalist, would take his young grandson to the woods to point out flora and fauna.
As a child, “my only concern was what if, by the time I went to college and became an entomologist, everything we wanted to know about insects was known,” Mussen told writer Mea McNeil for the American Bee Journal series.
"When he enrolled in graduate school, the only research opening was in the Basil Furgala lab," McNeil wrote. "Furgala, who researched bee viruses, took him to the apiary, grabbed a bee and let it sting him to make sure he could work there."
Mussen's nomination packet included the following comments:
- "Eric is without a doubt the epitome of a State Extension Specialist."
- "Without a doubt, Dr. Mussen is the premier authority on bees and pollination in California, and is one of the top beekeeping authorities nationwide."
- "He is a treasure to the beekeeping industry... he is a walking encyclopedia when it comes to honey bees."
- "He is a trusted information source."
Considered by his peers as one of the most respected and influential professional apiculturists in the nation, Mussen was named the California Beekeeper of the Year in 2006, won the American Association of Professional Apiculturists’ Award of Excellence in Extension Apiculture in 2007, and in 2008 he received the Distinguished Achievement Award in Extension from the Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America. He received the statewide Pedro Ilic Outstanding Agricultural Educator Award in 2010. This year he and four other colleagues ("The Bee Team"--Neal Williams, Robbin Thorp, Brian Johnson and Lynn Kimsey) won the team award from the Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America.
Mussen educates the beekeeping industry and general public with his bimonthly newsletter, from the UC Apiaries, which he launched in 1976. It appears on the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology website, as does his Bee Briefs, addressing such issues as diseases, pesticides and swarms.
Mussen is a five-time president of the Western Apicultural Society, an organization he helped found in 1977. He was a founder and alternated between president and secretary/treasurer of the American Association of Professional Apiculturists for many years.
Mussen, who is the UC Davis representative to the California State Apiary Board, offers input to the Department of Pesticide Regulation, particularly with the pesticide registration group. He works closely with Cooperation Extension, California Department of Food and Agriculture, California Department of Pesticide Regulation, the California Farm Bureau Federation, researchers in the UC system, researchers at the USDA/ARS honey bee laboratories at Beltsville, Md.; Baton Rouge, La.; and Tucson, Ariz., and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, among others.
Highly sought by the news media for his expertise on bees, Mussen has appeared on the Lehrer Hour, BBC, Good Morning America, and quoted in scores of news media, including the New York Times, National Public Radio, Boston Globe, and Los Angeles Times.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Mussen has been named the recipient of the 2013 Alexander Hodson Graduate Alumni Award from the University of Minnesota. He will receive the award at a ceremony on Thursday, May 30 in the Cargill Building on the St. Paul campus.
A native of Schenectady, N.Y., Mussen received his bachelor’s degree in entomology from the University of Massachusetts (after turning down an offer to play football at Harvard) and then received his master’s degree and doctorate in entomology from the University of Minnesota in 1969 and 1975, respectively.
His doctoral research focused on the epidemiology of a viral disease of larval honey bees, sacbrood virus. "During those studies I also was involved in studies concerning sunflower pollination and control of a microsporidian parasite of honey bees, Nosema apis," Mussen recalled. "Now a new species of Nosema has displaced N. apis and is even more difficult to keep subdued."
“Given this foundation, he was confronted with many new challenges regarding honey bee health and pollination concerns when he arrived at UC Davis in 1976,” said William Hutchison, professor and head of the Department of Entomology at the University of Minnesota. “Some 37 years later, he is still actively ‘tackling’ these new challenges--mites, diseases, and Africanized honey bees, to name a few--to enhance the pollination success of California's diverse agricultural cropping systems, with considerable emphasis on almonds. In brief, he is in demand, and he continues to be the primary source for objective information on honey bee health, and pollination in California.”
Professors H.C. Chiang and Basil Furgala supervised his graduate work.
"I am basically all pro-bee,” Mussen told the American Bee Journal in a two-part feature story published in the September of 2011. “Whatever I can do for bees, I do it...It doesn’t matter whether there is one hive in the backyard or 15,000 colonies. Bees are bees and the bees’ needs are the bees’ needs.”
As a child, “my only concern was what if, by the time I went to college and became an entomologist, everything we wanted to know about insects was known,” Mussen told writer Mea McNeil for the American Bee Journal series.
"When he enrolled in graduate school, the only research opening was in the Basil Furgala lab," McNeil wrote. "Furgala, who researched bee viruses, took him to the apiary, grabbed a bee and let it sting him to make sure he could work there."
Mussen's nomination packet included the following comments:
- "Eric is without a doubt the epitome of a State Extension Specialist."
- "Without a doubt, Dr. Mussen is the premier authority on bees and pollination in California, and is one of the top beekeeping authorities nationwide."
- "He is a treasure to the beekeeping industry... he is a walking encyclopedia when it comes to honey bees."
- "He is a trusted information source."
Mussen, with four other colleagues, comprised the UC Davis Bee Team that won the 2013 team award from the Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America.
Mussen educates the beekeeping industry and general public with his bimonthly newsletter, from the UC Apiaries, which he launched in 1976. Since 1976, he has also written Bee Briefs, addressing such issues as diseases, pesticides and swarms. Both publications are on the UC Davis Department of Entomology.
"With the decline of the honey bee population and the increase of the mysterious colony collapse disorder, his expertise is now more highly sought than ever,” Godfrey pointed out. “Any threat to honey bees is a threat to agriculture and a cause for his concern and a desire to assist. He is the only Extension Apiculturist in the UC system and in many regards, functions as the Extension entomologist for apiculture in the western U.S. and indeed, much of the country.”
Mussen is a five-time president of the Western Apicultural Society, an organization he helped found in 1977. He was a founder and alternated between president and secretary/treasurer of the American Association of Professional Apiculturists for many years. He's delivered the keynote addresses at the California State Beekeepers’ Association (CSBA) and at the American Honey Producers’ Association conventions. In addition, he provides leadership roles in the CSBA, the California Bee Breeders’ Association, California Farm Bureau Federation, American Honey Producers’ Association, National Honey Board, American Beekeeping Federation, and the Northern California Entomology Society, among others.
Mussen, who is the UC Davis representative to the California State Apiary Board, offers input to the Department of Pesticide Regulation, particularly with the pesticide registration group
Mussen works closely with Cooperation Extension, California Department of Food and Agriculture, California Department of Pesticide Regulation, the California Farm Bureau Federation, researchers in the UC system, researchers at the USDA/ARS honey bee laboratories at Beltsville, Md; Baton Rouge, La.; Tucson, Ariz., Weslaco, Texas, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, among others.
Mussen serves on various committees and task forces of state and national organizations, reviews numerous manuscripts for journals; reviews annual research proposals to the California State Beekeepers’ Association, the Almond Board of California, and the National Honey Board; reviews Small Business Innovation Research applications at the federal level; and is requested to comment on promotion evaluations for university and USDA researchers.
Highly sought by the news media for his expertise on bees, Mussen has appeared on the Lehrer Hour, BBC, Good Morning America, and quoted in the New York Times, National Public Radio, Boston Globe, and Los Angeles Times, among others.
He was nominated by Marla Spivak, Distinguished McKnight University Professor of Apiculture (former recipient of the award), and Gary Reuter, apiculture technician, both with the University of Minnesota. Faculty and staff from UC Davis contributed to the nomination package.
The award memorializes Alexander C. Hodson, Department Head from 1960-1974 who died on March 13, 1966 at the age of 89. Hodson, born in Reading, Mass., received his master’s degree in 1931 and his doctorate in 1935 from the University of Minnesota. The Hodson Graduate Alumni Award was established in 1998 to recognize and honor outstanding alumni of the Department of Entomology.