Current Lab Members

Mary Hart, PhD

Courtesy Postdoc & Adjunct Lecturer

Vincent Cannataro

My dissertation research is on the evolution that occurs within multicellular organisms. The human body is maintained by millions of small populations of stem cells that continually divide throughout a person’s lifetime. These divisions can result in mutations, and mutations may alter the fitness of stem cell lineages. I use mathematical models to analyze how these fitness changes can accumulate and result in aging, tumors, and cancer.

Outside of my dissertation I have been conducting research with my NSF IGERT fellowship cohort. We are using air traffic and epidemiological models to conduct a risk assessment for the arrival of Rift Valley Fever into the USA, optimizing routine sampling efforts to minimize the time to detection of an introduced pathogen, and modeling the coupled dynamics of pathogens within and between hosts with the dynamics of the immune system within hosts (immunoepidemiology).
More information on my research and some other fun science can be found on my personal site: vcannataro.com

PhD Candidate

Ping Huang

My research interests lie mainly in questions addressing how environmental gradients, especially the ones modified by human activities, leading to variation in animal populations or communities, particularly (but not restricted) to behavioral aspects. I am particularly fascinated by the concept ‘behavioral syndrome’ addressing consistent individual variation in suite of correlated behaviors due to pleiotrophic effects of genetic or physiological traits. My dissertation thus focused on urban-rural variation of behavioral syndrome using Northern Cardinals. My results thus far revealed that urban birds were significantly more neophilic and less neophobic than rural birds. The significant relationships between Individual’s syndrome scores and its morphological trait as well as stress hormone profile suggested some underlying physiological mechanisms for rural-urban variation is indeed possible.

Ping’s CV

PhD Candidate, Joint in the Kimball Lab

Zachary Emberts

I am broadly interested in understanding why animals look and behave the way that they do. Like many people, I am most captivated by elaborate traits, such as animal weapons, that can be found throughout the animal kingdom. Thus, for my dissertation, I am investigating elaborate hind legs in the Coreidae clade, and the evolutionary pressures responsible for their form and function.

PhD Student, Joint in the Miller Lab, Entomology

Taryn Gainer

My current research is focused on the human dimensions of recreational fisheries in Florida. I use social research methods to assess the quality of stakeholders’ recreational experiences, evaluate support for regulatory actions and measure stakeholder perspectives on fish stocking. I am also working on developing population models that assess the performance of stock enhancement relative to alternative management strategies. My past research has focused on evaluating the effects of hatchery-rearing on fish physiology, behavior and fitness.

PhD Student, Joint in the Lorenzen Lab, Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences

Arthur Rudolph

PhD Candidate

M. Scarlett Tudor

PhD Candidate, Joint in the Miller Lab, Entomology, On Leave