Lab News

Drew Hart has been awarded a $4,600 grant from the Organization for Tropical Studies (OTS) Emerging Challenges in Tropical Science program for his project on morphological variation in cloud forest epiphytes.  Drew will travel to three OTS field stations in Costa Rica next summer to collect epiphyte specimens for this project and potential followup studies.

Skye Glenn’s undergraduate honors thesis was highlighted in this month’s issue of Breakthroughs, the magazine of the UC Berkeley College of Natural Resources.  Skye’s work examined genetic variation in California newts inhabiting the East Bay parks.

https://nature.berkeley.edu/breakthroughs/undergraduate-research

Mike Yuan has two recent 2016 publications now in print:

Blekhman R, Tang K, Archie EA, Barreiro LB, Johnson ZP, Wilson ME, Kohn J, Yuan ML, Gesquiere L, Grieneisen L, Tung J (2016) Common methods for fecal sample storage in long-term field studies have a minimal impact on gut microbiome profiles. Scientific Reports, 6: 31519. DOI: 10.1038/srep31519

Snyder-Mackler N, Majoros WH, Yuan ML, Shaver AO, Gordon J, Kopp G, Schlebusch S, Wall JD, Alberts SC, Mukherjee S, Zhou X, Tung J (2016) Efficient genome-wide sequencing and low coverage pedigree analysis from non-invasively collected samples. Genetics, 203: 699-714. DOI: 10.1534/genetics.116.187492

Our NSF Dimensions of Biodiversity grant on the Landscape Genomics of an Adaptive Radiation has just been approved! In collaboration with Luke Mahler at the University of Toronto, we’ll be examining genomic and morphological variation at the population level across 12 species of Anolis lizards from the Greater Antilles.

Ian Wang has been named a 2016 Hellman Fellow by the Hellman Family Faculty Fund. The award, established in 1995 to “support substantially the research of promising assistant professors who show capacity for great distinction in their research,” includes a grant of $60,000 for this lab’s project on “Genomic Responses to a Century of Climate Change in California.”

Amy, Emani, and Skye officially became the first lab graduates today. Amy received her degree from the College of Letters and Sciences, and Skye and Emani graduated from the College of Natural Resources.  It’s sad to see our undergrads leave, but they’re all moving on to wonderful things!

Guin Wogan has received a $9,000 grant from the American Genetics Association for her work on toads from southeast Asia.  This is an understudied region, and Guin has consistently uncovered new and exciting ways to study important components of this biodiversity hot spot that further our understanding of amphibian biology in general.

Emani Harris and Skye Glenn displayed research posters at the SPUR Undegrad Poster Session on Cal Day. Emani’s project is on the phylogeography of the Pacific treefrog (Pseudacris regilla), and Skye’s project is on landscape genetics in the California newt (Taricha torosa). Both of these are senior projects for which they received grants from the SPUR program.

Amy Tsai won the award for best poster at the Spring Honors Poster Session out of all Molecular and Cell Biology majors with a concentration in Neurobiology!  Amy’s honor’s thesis is on population genetic responses to climate change in the Shasta salamander (Hydromantes shastae), an endangered salamander with a restricted range in Northern California.  The award is the result of a lot of hard work and many late nights in the lab.

Guin Wogan’s paper on natural history collections as windows into evolutionary processes has just been published in Molecular Ecology.

M.W. Holmes, T. T. Hammond, G. O. U. Wogan, R. E. Walsh, K. LaBarbera, E. A. Wommack, J. C. Crawford, F. M. Martins, K. L. Mack, L. M. Bloch, and M.W. Nachman. 2016. Natural history collections as windows on evolutionary processes. Molecular Ecology v. 25: 864–881. DOI: 10.1111/mec.13529