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RESEARCH BLOG
Undergraduate Researcher
Spring 2018 - Graduation
EBIO Honors Thesis: Feeding Behavior of a Seed Eating Caterpillar and its Effect on Caterpillar Growth
I have just begun work on my honors thesis in the biology department at CU thanks to the support of the Bowers Lab. I have applied for several related grants and will hopefully hear about funding soon.
Once again, this project is based on the interactions of Helicoverpa Zea and Lupinus Texensis but I will be examining their relationship from the side of the caterpillar. How might the chemical defenses of the Lupine affect the growth of H. zea caterpillars? In studying the seed pods of the Lupine for herbivory, I also noticed a strange disperse eating pattern. Caterpillars appeared to have chewed all the way through the pod casing but only eat a single seed before moving on to another pod. Several studies have outlined the benefits of dispersed eating to leaf-eating caterpillars. However, chewing through the low-nutrient pod has a much higher time and energy cost for a seed eater so I anticipate that this dispersed eating must have even greater benefits for a seed eater.
For this project, I will be in charge of managing an even larger lab population of H. zea and Lupines than I did before. I am both excited and nervous. The corn earworms caterpillars are excellent escape artists and this time it is crucial that I avoid inbreeding.
Undergraduate Researcher
Working with IUVS Images at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics
Summer 2017 - Summer 2018
I worked with IDL for the first time to create images from IUVS data. IUVS stands for the Imaging Ultraviolet Spectrograph and is one of several measuring instruments aboard the MAVEN spacecraft orbiting Mars. A large part of my work has involved working with the University of Colorado's Science on a Sphere projector system to show IUVS data to the public. Recently LASP acquired its own Magic Planet (another spherical projector system) which I have been managing. It has been really fun to work with and see the code I worked so hard on projected there.
Lately, I have been working to compile IUVS images across a few days on Mars in order to look at cloud formation throughout a Martian day. I presented a poster on this topic at the March 2018 MAVEN PSG Conference. I love making posters and I think this one was particularly fun (even though it did not have any awesome graphs).
Research Assistant
Spring & Fall 2017
Managing Helicoverpa Zea and Lupinus Texensis Populations
This cute little moth (they have green eyes!) is a major agricultural pest. They are known as the corn earworm (H. zea) and cause over 1 billion dollars in crop damage each year. They also have some of the most aggressive caterpillars in the United States: they are cannibals. This was a very interesting discovery to happen upon as we were in the process of identifying the specimens.
These individuals were gathered, as caterpillars, from sites where Lupinus Texensis is studied by graduate student Megan Blanchard with the CU Bowers Lab. Much of my work as a research assistant was cataloging Lupine seeds and the effect that herbivores, such as the corn earworm, had on the development of their seed pods. Additionally, I helped with chemical analysis of seeds in order to determine the relationships between chemical defenses of the seeds and their position on the plant. I highly recommend you contact Megan Blanchard if you are interested in learning more about chemical defenses of plants at varying scales.
One of the most rewarding things I was able to achieve during this project was that I figured out a new way to sex Helicoverpa Zea, from their pupa. Unfortunately, this difference is very difficult to photograph but hopefully, I will be able to share this relatively simple method soon.
High School and Early College Research
In my first two semesters at CU Boulder, I have been doing class-related research on the effects of soil and water pH on Riparian ecosystems and the coevolution of predators and prey using the phylogentic method used to identify coevolution between parasites and hosts.
In an effort to explore my interest in interdisciplinary activities, I have been pursuing the combination of the fields of parasitology and invasive ecology. Johnson Lab at CU has been collecting data for several years on amphibians in the California Bay Area and their parasites and just recently began collecting data on the invasive fish parasites from the same region. I saw this the perfect opportunity to add something new to the field of invasion ecology.
Short interview about the project at 2:06
Independent Research Project
Predator-Prey Coevolution
In order to examine the coevolution of parasites and hosts, scientists have used phylogenetic trees to exhibit that the most closely related parasites also have the most closely related hosts. Predators and their prey can share a similar relationship.
Spring 2016
I therefore created a larger scale parasite-host comparison tree for tropical and savanna ecosystems. The tropical predator-prey tree is shown to the right. The thick lines connect predators to their prefered prey while grey lines connect predators to all likely prey. The analysis below is called a Mantel analysis and it uses matrices to compare distances (in this case, base pair differences from comparing Mega 7 generated phylogenetic trees) between predators and their prey.
This experiment validated this new phylogentic comparison stategy.
for more information contact me:
NSF-Funded Lab Research Project
Effect of Parasites from Invasive Fish on Native Amphibians
Predictive Model Creation from Empirical Data
Fall 2014 - Spring 2015
This has been my longest and most extensive research project yet. I began the work in a high school research class and partnered with CU Boulder's Johnson Lab. I continued to work with this parasite-focused lab for the next summer under an NSF grant. This project was my attempt to combine the fields of parasitology and invasion ecology and in studying it I expanded on the exsisting models for invasive parasites because there is very little literature on the subject.
After taking first place in Ecological Sciences at the Corden Pharma Science Fair, I moved on to CSEF, the Colorado Science and Engineering Fair where I also won first place in Ecology. This project is something that I am incredibly proud of and it has shown me much more about the world of science. If you would like to read the full paper I wrote on the topic:
Learning Mathematica: Experimental Physics
Spring 2016
During the second semester of my freshman year, I learned how to work in Mathematica, a common physics coding language.
I learned a lot and was able to preform complex analyses on physical data that I collected.
It was just really awesome.
I also had the opportunity to practice some coding in Python during the summer of 2017.
Independent Research Project
Fall 2015
Litter pH and Nitrogen Levels in Riparian Ecosystems
During my first semester at CU Boulder, studying ecology, I did an independent research project on how litter levels affect the pH and nitrogen levels of a stream habitat.
pH and nitrogen are very important to fish health and growth of plantkon-like primary producers which are essential to riparian ecosystems.
The top graphs demonstrate the relationships between percentage of litter cover in an area and that area's pH and nitrogen levels. The bottom graphs demonstrate a separate analysis, which show that the location along Boulder Creek was a better predictor of pH than litter cover which means a much larger experiment would need to be implemented before conclusions can be drawn on this topic.
Loss of Pigmentation in Solenaciae
Funded Lab Research Project
This was my first big biological research project. I had the honor of being mentored by Stacey Smith of CU Boulder's Smith Lab, and worked on finding the genetic mechanism underlying the loss of pigmentation in Solenaciae flowers.
Feel free to browse through my final presentation on the subject.
The transitions did not upload properly to this wix so there is some strange overlapping text.
Summer 2014