Tulane University

Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Newsletter

Vol. 10, Fall 2012

Dear EEBer,

The Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology (EEB) has continued to ex-pand in size and to grow in strength again this year. The three younger faculty mem-bers who joined the department four years (Jordan Karubian, Cori Richards-Zawacki, and Caz Taylor) ago have passed their third-year reviews; and Michael Blum, who came to Tulane six years ago, has earned tenure. This year we welcome aboard another new faculty member Elizabeth Derryberry, who has research interests in behavioral ecology. She received her Ph.D. degree from the Duke University in 2007. Her re-search is featured in this newsletter.

Following a department-wide review of the undergraduate curriculum to plan for future academic programs, we have implemented a new theory and methods course as part of the core requirements. All sophomore majors will take the class to prepare them for upper-level classes that are now in existence and those planned for the future – all of which will incorporate new information and approaches consistent with advances in the discipline. And we have remodeled our ecology lab to include the latest technology for instruction and to reformat the layout of the lab to enhance the classroom experience.

The departmental faculty look forward to the potential for continued expansion and achievement as the School of Science and Engineering, of which we are a part, moves forward with new initiatives under the School’s excellent leadership. If you visit New Orleans, please stop by to see what’s happening in EEB.

David C. Heins, Professor & Chair

EEB is in the School of Science and Engineering. The Department office is located in the Boggs Center for Energy and Biotechnology,

Suite 400. Faculty offices and labs are also located in Stern Hall and the Israel Building.

UNDERGRADUATE AWARDS

The Fred R. Cagle Memorial PrizeBenjamin Thomas Jones The Fred R. Cagle Memorial Prize was awarded to Ben Jones because of his academic record, the difficulty of his curriculum as well as the likelihood that he will make a substantial contribution to scholarship in the biological sciences going forward. Ben was a double major in both EEB and Mathematics. He completed an EEB honors thesis working with Caz Taylor studying the dispersal of blue crabs. This fall, Ben entered graduate school at MIT / Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.

The Newcomb Zoology PrizeDaniela Rose Kurzban The Newcomb Zoology Prize is awarded to a Newcomb senior for outstanding achievement in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. Daniela impressed the department by consistently performing at a superior level in all of her EEB courses. Daniela is very bright and she approached the academic rigors of EEB with sophistication and insightfulness.

The Stuart S. Bamforth Prize for Excellence in Environmental StudiesCassandra Parran Campbell The Stuart Bamforth Prize is awarded to a deserv-ing student based on his/her merit in the field of Environmental Studies. Cassan-dra demonstrated excellence as she earned a BS in Environmental Science. She also graduated with a second degree in Philosophy.

The Phi Beta Phi AwardFrida Anna Zink The Phi Beta Phi Award is given to a Junior or Senior for the best paper based on experimental work in biological sciences. Nominated papers are reviewed by members of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cell and Molecular Biology, Physics and Chemistry, and the recipient is determined by a consensus between these departments. Frida completed a senior honors thesis with Dr. Mike Blum on the phylogeography and population genetics of Neritina granosa, a migra-tory (amphidromous) freshwater snail endemic to Hawaii. She was selected for this award in recognition of the depth, scope and quality of the project.

DEPARTMENT AWARDSThe Gerald E. Gunning Memorial Award, for two recipientsCatherine Isabelle Emily Rich Each year this award is given to two exceptional undergraduate EEB students. Catherine Rich proved herself to be an extremely enthusiastic, motivated learner who did extremely well in all her courses, includ-ing EEB courses.Kaitlin Allison Arford Tasker Katie showed her merit as an undergradu-ate EEB major through her dedicated work in and out of the classroom. She worked with Cori Richards-Zawacki researching poison dart frogs in the tropics of Panama.

The Senior Scholars AwardLaura Matthews Laura received the Senior Scholars Award for her membership in the honors program and for having a GPA of 3.6 or higher. Laura was an EEB / Anthropology double major, who completed her honors thesis with Caz Taylor modeling human population genetics.Benjamin Thomas Jones Ben was an honors student with a GPA of 3.6 or high-er. He completed his honors thesis with Caz Taylor doing oceanographic modeling of blue crab dispersal. Emily Cardarelli Emily was an Earth and Environmental Science major who had a GPA of 3.6 or higher and successfully completed an honors thesis studying the Davis Pond diversion.

GRADUATE AWARDS

Teaching Assistant Awards, for two recipientsAndrew James Laughlin Andrew was selected for a Teaching Assistant Award for his invaluable help in the basic-level lab, Diversity of Life. Not only did his responsibilities include teaching his own lab section, but he was also tasked to prepare for the lab for all sections each week. Andrew excelled in both aspects of his assistantship. Ashley Marie Peele Ashley was selected for a Teaching Assistant Award for her invaluable help in the Ecology lab, an upper-level course. Ashley consistently went above and beyond her general responsibilities.

Two of EEB’s finest were honored in the Newcomb College Institute’s Under the Oaks ceremony held this past spring: alumna Karoun Bagamian and graduating senior Charlotte Grace Sprehn.

Karoun Bagamian received the Young Alumna Award from the Newcomb Alumnae Association. The award honors the ongoing contributions and achieve-ments of an alumna under the age of 40. Karoun got her first taste of scientific research as an undergrad in Dr. David Heins’ lab, where she wrote her honors thesis on the effects of parasitism on the threespine stickleback, which was published in an international journal. She graduated with a BS in Ecology and Evo-lutionary Biology in 2001.

Karoun completed her PhD at Emory University earlier this year, as a student affiliated with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Viral Special Pathogens Branch. During the course of her graduate education she received a CDC Public Health Dissertation grant and a CDC ORISE Fellow-ship. Her dissertation just received the 2012 Wild-life Disease Association (WDA) Graduate Student Research Recognition Award, which enabled her to present her work at the International WDA Confer-ence in Lyon, France. To date, she has published two manuscripts from her dissertation work in widely

Newcomb Ceremony Honors Student and Alumna

Elizabeth Derryberry recently joined the growing Ecology and Evolutionary Biology department. Dr.

Dr. Elizabeth Derryberry

Derryberry graduated in 2000 with a B. A. degree from Princeton University, and in 2007, she received her Ph.D. from the Biol-ogy Department at Duke University. She went on to join the Museum of Natu-ral Science at Louisiana State University before coming to Tulane.

Elizabeth is a behavior-al ecologist who is inter-ested in how the environ-ment shapes the evolution of acoustic sensory and signaling systems in birds. She also pursues research

Derryberry studies how the urban environment affects the contemporary evolution of bird song. In a recent study, she documented the cultural evolution of bird song over time in San Francisco. She found evidence to suggest that today’s birds sing louder than in 1969 in order to be heard over the din of the city.

Meet the Newest EEB Faculty Member

read and prestigious journals. Currently, Karoun is a postdoctoral associate in

Department of Geography and Emerging Pathogens Institute with Dr. Jason Blackburn at the University of Florida. She will be investigating the spatio-temporal dynamics of bacterial zoonoses (plague, anthrax and others), as well as disease spillover into wildlife and livestock populations in the countries of the former Soviet Union.

Considering the hard work and dedication she brought to the Heins lab as an undergraduate, there is no surprise that Karoun went on to achieve great suc-cess as a graduate student.

Charlotte Grace Sprehn entered Tulane as part of the inaugural Newcomb Scholars Program, in which a select group of women share an academically-rich college experience during their time at Tulane. She was honored as being the first Newcomb Scholar to graduate, one year ahead of the rest of her Newcomb Scholars class.

Grace earned a BS in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology this spring, working mostly in the lab of Dr. Michael Blum. She is back at Tulane this fall pursu-ing her master’s degree with Dr. Blum and Dr. Heins.

EEB is proud of her accomplishments and thrilled to be able to continue to work with her.

in avian systematics, using phylogenomic approaches to understand the evolutionary relationships of bird species. She combines her interests in behavior and systematics to address the tempo and mode of song evolution within ecologically diverse radiations.

This fall, Elizabeth is teaching Introduction to Animal Behavior and developing the major’s newest course, Theories and Methods of Ecology and Evo-lutionary Biology, with Dr. Donata Henry. This new course will provide majors with an introduction to

the fundamental theories and methods of the disci-pline through case studies drawn from the research of faculty in the department.

Elizabeth is also in-volved with developing scientific teaching prac-tices. Since 2009, she has been attending and leading workshops on active learn-ing, backwards design and assessment development. She finds the process of sci-entific teaching exciting and effective and enjoys sharing ideas and experiences with other teachers.

What do you do when you need leaves from the top of the canopy? You use a slingshot! In this great photo from the field, senior Kyle Colbenz collects samples for his work with Dr. Van Bael in Panama.

It’s worth a shot!

When alumni, parents and friends make donations to the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, they help to enhance the outstanding educational experi-ences for undergraduate and graduate students. We strive to integrate our scientific and educational missions in ecology and evolutionary biology by discovering new knowledge through programmatic research and by providing an academically rich learning environment for both undergraduate and graduate students. Direct dona-tions contribute to teaching, research, and service by funding educational programs.

There are two options when choosing to give directly to EEB: unrestricted gifts and restricted gifts.

Unrestricted gifts are credited directly to the General Endowed Fund of the EEB Department, unless otherwise specified. The General Endowed Fund was es-tablished in 2007 with a generous gift from Katherine S. Giffin (BA, 1925). The

Fund is used to support a variety of programs including the Undergraduate Fellows. Contributions may be sent in care of the Chair of the Department. Checks should be made out to “Tulane University” with the note “EEB General Endowed Fund, #050195.”

Restricted gifts may be given to support the department in a more specific way. For example, restricted gifts have been used to initiate fellowships to support un-dergraduate or graduate research in the summer, graduate fellowships to support completion of dissertations during the academic year, or undergraduate awards for research or achievement. Please contact the Chair of the Department to discuss re-stricted giving.

Thank you for considering a gift to EE Biology in support of the educational programs of the Department.

Determine the Destination of your Donation: Give Directly to the EEB Department

Dr. Van Bael has begun a new project to study the endophytic fungi of Jatropha curcas, a plant that is being used for biofuel (jatropha) throughout the tropics.

Endophytic fungi (or endophytes) are plant sym-bionts that reside cryptically inside of plant tissues without causing disease symptoms. In many cases, fungal endophytes have been shown to help plants tolerate drought, metals, heat, and pests. Thus, these non-obvious fungal symbionts have been lik-ened to a plant “immune system.”

Van Bael and her collaborator, Luis Mejia, have begun to isolate and study the endophytes of jat-ropha. They are especially interested in jatropha because it has the potential to advance develop-

The Ecology of Biofuel Jatropha curcas and the Fungi that Protect It

Nicole Michel, a recently fledged PhD from Tom Sherry’s lab, has provided a surprising new answer to this question for tropical Central American rainforests: peccaries. Collared pecca-ries, also known as javelinas in the southwestern US, have dramatically increased in abundance at La Selva Biological Station, Costa Rica, since the 1970s, probably in part due to predator declines. Many species of understory insect-eating birds have simultaneously declined or disappeared altogether from the reserve (as documented by another former student in the lab, Dr. Bryan Si-

ing nations by providing en-ergy, food, and enabling reme-diation of defor-ested landscapes. Jatropha can help alleviate poverty because the plant can be harvested and processed by small-scale farmers on the farm for immedi-

Jatropha is rich in oil and pro-vides two crops per year, mak-ing it more sustainable and eco-friendly than other biofuel plants.

ate use as a cooking fuel. Besides the benefits of oil production, jatropha offers additional ecologi-cal benefits. As a perennial shrub it stores carbon and may mitigate climate change. Plantings also prevent erosion and promote soil regeneration in lands heavily impacted by human use.

The checker-throated antwren is one species of birds whose population has declined in the tropical forests of Costa Rica

Dr. Caz Taylor and grad student Jessica Henkel have been looking at the big picture of the 2010 BP oil disaster. In a recent study, they posit that although only a small fraction of migrating shorebirds showed visible signs of oiling, the disaster has other, lasting con-sequences for the populations of these birds. Other effects such as degradation of habitat, diminished health, diminished plumage quality, changing prey, switching habitat and de-layed migration can have an impact for many years. Furthermore, the ecosystems affected may not only be along the gulf coast, but also in Canada and the arctic where these birds return each year to breed. Henkel says, “Migratory shorebirds provide a system for evalu-ating the direct and indirect effects of an oil spill on affected habitats and the potential for carryover effects to other ecosystems.” The study was published in the July issue of Bioscience, and has been featured by several New Orleans media outlets.

EEB Research Snapshot: BP Oil Spill Impact

New EEB PhD Ponders ‘Where have all the birds gone?’

These six shorebirds could suffer long-term effects from the oil spill. On the right, lead author and EEB grad student, Jessica Henkel carefully traps birds in Waveland, MS.

gel). Dr. Michel has found that collared peccaries consume, dig up, and trample rain-forest understory vegetation includ-ing vines and lia-nas. These vines and lianas often form dense tangles where trees have fallen and trap fallen leaf litter, attracting insects.

Understory insectivorous birds such as Dot-winged and Checker-throated Antwrens, which forage nearly exclusively on insects in aerial leaf litter, and also evade predators that are unable to penetrate the dense vine tangles. Peccaries reduce the frequency of these liana tangles, and as a result have contributed to declines of these birds at La Selva.

Nicole Michel has published a portion of this work in the open source book “Tropical Forests,”

put out by InTech Publishing (March 2012), and also has a manuscript on a different experi-ment in review at Oikos. Earlier this year, Nicole was accepted as one of 20 students and post-docs nation-ally to attend the Ecological Soci-ety of America’s

Emerging Issues Conference at the National Con-servation Training Center in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, where she presented a poster entitled “Walking the Line Between the ‘Empty Forest’ and ‘Ecological Meltdown’: Managing to Prevent the Tropical Biodiversity Crisis in an Era of Meso-herbivore Decline and Release.” This work pro-vides a framework for conserving tropical rainfor-est biodiversity by maintaining moderate densities of large consumers such as peccaries. This same poster later won Third Place in Tulane’s School of Science and Engineering Research Day poster session.

Dr. Michel will be presenting results of this re-search at international Ecology and Tropical Bi-ology conferences in Brazil and Portland, Oregon this summer, then returning to Tulane in the fall to teach Diversity of Life labs.

The rise of the collared pec-cary contributes to the decline of the understory insect-eat-ing birds.

Usually endophytic fungi, or endophytes, grow cryptically inside of most plant tissues, unseen by humans. Here we have isolated the fungi and grown them into pure culture to observe colony structure on a macroscale. The diversity and abundance of endo-phytic fungi is very high in tropical plants, and many endophytes produce chemical compounds that are rel evant to plant ecology and to human medicine.

Van Bael and Mejia’s research in Panama rep-resents some of the first steps toward understand-ing the microbial ecology of jatropha in its native range. Although their current investigations are limited to Panama, they are seeking funding to expand their endophyte work into Haiti, where a grassroots jatropha industry is providing jobs and fuel in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake. Next summer, Van Bael plans to begin studying jatropha endophytes in southern Florida, where the plant is being cultivated outside of its native range.

Caruso is a Genus!

Unlike that popular cable channel, Dr. John Caruso doesn’t spend one week talking about sharks, he spends an entire semester! As an ichthyologist he loves teaching about all fishes including sharks, but his real passion is for grisly, deep sea anglerfish.

Dr. Caruso has been studying anglerfish since he was a grad student at Tulane in the 1970s. He is currently one of only two biologists in the world with a focus on these fishes.

The other is Dr. Theodore Pietsch of the University of Washington who, along with Italian ichthyologist Dr. Giorgio Carnevale, recently named a new genus of pre-historic anglerfish Caruso. The Caruso anglerfishes were identified during the analysis of a cache of fossils found in the Italian Alps that date back to the Eocene period.

In the article about the new genus published in The Journal of Systematic Palaeontology, the authors explain “We are pleased to name this genus in honor of John H. Caruso of Tulane University for his years of service to the world ichthyological community and for his many publi-cations on anglerfish systematics.”

Dr. Caruso is truly honored. Not even a basic cable TV event called “Anglerfish Week” could top this!

Phil Schapker, class of 2010 I am currently at Oregon State University and having a blast work-ing as the assistant curator to the largest insect collection in the Pacific Northwest. I am charged with the task of managing a crew of undergraduate workers as we barcode, photograph, and database our collection’s 3.5 million specimens. Towards my MS degree in Zoology I am working on a taxonomic revision of a small and quite handsome genus of longhorn beetles, the elderberry-boring Desmocerus, and building an interactive online re-source for its subfamily, Lepturinae. Some of the more exciting activities in my first year of grad school have been hiking in snowshoes at 2 AM to the tops of mountains in Oregon, helping my advi-sor, Dr. Chris Marshall search for our rare endemic “ice crickets,” as well as my own recent discovery of a new species in my Desmocerus! (p.s. If there are any bug-collecting alums who have elderberry near their houses on the east coast, I’d be willing to trade for some fresh material of D. palliatus).

Mary Grace Lemon, class of 2011 For most of the past year I’ve been interning at Dauphin Island Sea Lab in Frank Hernandez’s zooplankton and ichthyoplankton lab. I did quite a bit of plankton sorting and ichthyoplankton identification. My fa-vorite part was all the boat work I was able to do and the sargassum project we were working on. We went out way off shore multiple times a week to find and collect sargassum. It was like a wild goose hunt. During my internship I applied to mas-ters programs and was accepted by the University

of North Carolina, Wilmington and started in Au-gust. My advisors are Martin Posey and Michael Mallin. My project will mostly be looking at the effect of oyster reef structure and oyster physiol-ogy on water quality.

Emilie Ospina, class of 2011 My first field research experience was with David Winkler’s Golondrinas de Las Americas project. I assisted in monitoring the breeding success of Tree Swal-lows (T. bicolor) in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada which included daily nest checks, measur-ing chicks at various stages of development, band-ing and collecting blood samples from chicks and adults, and conducting procedures to assess egg metabolism and chick thermoregulation. I then col-laborated with a co-intern to launch a research site on the island of Chiloe, Chile in order to monitor the breeding success of Chilean Swallows (Tachy-cineta meyeni).

Additionally, I was in charge of collecting video footage during the laying sequence and incubation period of the swallows to enhance the accuracy of previously collected data as part of my position as data analyst. To assist local scientists I also banded and bled Thorn-tailed Rayaditos (Aphrastura spin-icauda) and extracted forest birds from mist nets. At the completion of the project I returned to Loui-siana and spent a field season working with Stefan Woltmann studying the effects of the BP oil spill on Seaside Sparrows (Ammodramus maritimus) and other marsh birds. Sampling was carried out both on oiled and unoiled marsh in order to mea-sure possible subclinical physiological responses

to oil exposure. My next field job brings me to Alabama where

I will be working for a graduate student in Frank Moore’s lab at USM as a research assistant helping out with ruby-throated hummingbirds. After that, one of my PI’s from Cornell has asked me to come back (with funding!) to work on incubation rhythm data collected from eastern bluebirds using iBut-tons. These iButtons collect temperature readings every 2 minutes and then I use R to splice them together for the course of the incubation period and subsequently analyze the data. I’ve also started to work on my paper looking at functional male incu-bation in Chilean swallows, previously unreported, which I found through the use of nestcams and iButton data.

Where Do Young Alums Go after Tulane and EEB?

A recent study coauthored by Dr. Michael Blum shows how BPA, which acts as a syn-thetic estrogen, affects species interactions between native and introduced stream fishes in the Southeast. The study showed that exposure increases the likelihood of hybridization, which can promote the spread of non-native species and increase extinction risk of native species. This photo demonstrates how this can happen: the color of non-native male red shiner (Cypri-nella lutrensis) weakens when exposed to BPA. Because female red shiners use coloration to determine mate choice, the change in the males’ color can cause females to be less choosy, which can increase instances of interbreeding with native blacktail shiner (Cyprinella venusta). The red shiner are already considered an invasive species because they hybridize with native blacktail shiner. This study indicates that exposure to pervasive estrogen-mimics, like BPA, could speed up the process.

EEB Research Snapshot: BPA in stream fish

Compiled By Dr. Donata Henry

The fish on the left were exposed to BPA for two weeks. The fish on the right were the control group.

EEB undergrads are exposed to a variety of field and lab work, in addition to academic scholarship, all of which prepares them for life after Tulane.

Two Tulane EEB students accompanied faculty member, Sunshine Van Bael to Gamboa, Panama for the summer to join her laboratory’s work with leaf-cutting ants and fungi.

Leaf-cutting ants are unable to metabolize cel-lulose from plant leaves, but they can eat certain fungi. So the ants cut pieces of leaves to use as compost to cultivate fungi in underground gar-dens.

Kyle Coblentz visited as part of NSF’s Re-search Experiences for Undergraduates program. He completed an independent project studying the abundance of leaves and cryptic fungi (en-dophytes) that leaf-cutting ants were carrying into their underground fungal gardens. His data helped produce a model that showed the ant col-onies were carrying ~9 meters squared of plant material per day into their gardens, and ~4 meters squared contained fungi growing inside of the

Leaf-cutting ants cut plant material to use as a compost in their underground fungal gardens. Leaf-cutter ants use teamwork and antibiotics to prepare leaf material as a compost for their fungal gardens. They are able to observe the ants’ behav-ior up close using entire colonies they bring back to the laboratory.

This past summer several members of the Rich-ards-Zawacki lab traveled to the Bocas del Toro Archipelago of Panama to study the ecology and evolution of poison frog Dendrobates pumilio. This tiny frog shows an amaz-ing amount of color and pat-tern variation across the archi-pelago and adjacent areas of mainland Panama, especially given that the archipelago has only been in existence for a few thousand years.

Much of the lab’s focus is on understanding the ecologi-cal and evolutionary forces that shape this variation. The frog’s bright colors and toxic skin suggest that natural selec-tion for predation avoidance might be shaping color signals while studies of female mat-ing behavior show that color is also under sexual selection. This was the lab’s third summer trip to Panama and this year the group of student researchers was seven strong, in-

cluding two PhD students and five undergraduates. PhD student Justin Yeager worked with under-

graduate Erin Valley and recent graduate Henry Bart to study the role of predators in shaping color pattern variation within and among frog

populations. This included a field study to assess preda-tion pressure on differently colored model frogs and an experiment to assess learned avoidance of different color morphs by a model predator (in this case, young chick-ens!).

Undergraduates Danny Lenger and Anisha Devar are investigating whether female mating preferences might also be contributing to color pattern diversification. While Anisha focused on laboratory mate choice ex-periments, Danny conducted

a mark-recapture experiment which, when paired with frog genotypes, will provide complimentary measurements of mating preferences from a wild

PhD Candidate Layla Freeborn and undergrad Julia Berkey collected tis-sue samples of reptiles and amphibians for phylogeo-graphical analysis

By Cori Richards-Zawacki

Poisonous Dart Frogs Across Bocas Del Toro Archipelago

Leaf-Cutting Ants and their Secret Fungal GardensBy Sunshine Van Bael

population. PhD student Layla

Freeborn and under-graduate Julia Berkey spent their summer collecting tissue sam-ples and other data from several reptile and amphibian spe-cies found through-out the archipelago. These samples will be used in a compara-tive phylogeography study to better under-stand the historical pattern of diversifi-cation in the archi-pelago.

Working at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute’s Bocas del Toro Research Station, all of these students got to participate first hand in research projects that may shed light on the mechanisms of evolution as they are playing out among the dart frogs of Bocas del Toro.

plant material. The ants spend hours decontami-nating the plant material and reducing the fungal load before they feed it to their own fungus.

Kim Mighell joined the project to gain experi-ence working with ants, fungi, and bryophytes. She begins as a graduate student this fall in EEB, and plans to continue work with endophytes, which are cryptic and highly diverse fungi living inside of plant tissues. Her project this summer looked at how ant behavior changed toward dif-ferent kinds of fungi that threatened their colo-nies.

Besides their own fungus that they cultivate for food, leaf-cutting ants come into contact with hundreds or more kinds of fungi. Not much is known about whether the ants deal with all fun-gi in a similar fashion, or if they have specific hygienic behaviors for different types. She also began a project looking at endophytes present in bryophytes.

Dr. Van Bael and her team display seven ant col-onies that they excavated in Gamboa, Panama. Once back in the laboratory, they studied the colonies, the fungi and the ant behavior towards the fungi. The two littlest team members are Dr. Van Bael’s sons, who love to help mom out in the field.

In the Works: Studying the Foraging Ecology of the Louisiana Brown Pelican

Dr. Jordan Karubian and post-doctoral fellow Dr. Scott Walter are applying GPS tracking devices to brown pelicans to assess how foraging ecology varies in relation to a range of environmental conditions, in-cluding oil exposure during the BP Deepwater Hori-zon oil spill as well as the hypoxic zone that forms off the coast of Louisiana each summer. An hypoxic zone, sometimes referred to as a dead zone, is an area within a large body of water where oxygen has become de-pleted and therefore is unable to support marine life. Dr. Karubian and Dr. Walter began their work earlier this year on the coast near Grand Isle, Louisiana.

visit us online: http://tulane.edu/sse/eebioDepartment of Ecology & Evolutionary BiologyTulane University400 Lindy BoggsNew Orleans, LA 70118-5698

Henry L. Bart 4054 Percival Stern Hall(504) 862-8283 hank@museum.tulane.edu

Mike Blum304 Environmental Science/Israel Bldg.(504) 862-8295mjblum@tulane.edu

John Caruso430 Lindy Boggs(504) 247-1553jcaruso@tulane.edu

Steven Darwin428 Lindy Boggs(504) 862-8286 darwin@tulane.edu

Elizabeth Derryberry362 Environmental Science/Israel Bldg.(504) 862-8285svanbael@tulane.edu

Bruce Fleury 4030 Percival Stern Hall(504) 862-8290bfleury@tulane.edu

David C. Heins432 Lindy Boggs(504) 865-5563 heins@tulane.edu

contact us...Donata Henry431 Lindy Boggs(504) 862-8299droome@tulane.edu

Jordan Karubian306 Environmental Science/Israel Bldg.(504) 865-5549jk@tulane.edu

John McLachlanTMC SL-3 Ctr Bio/Evr Rh(504) 988-6910jmclach@tulane.edu

Cori Richards-Zawacki308 Environmental Science/Israel Bldg.(504) 862-8288cori@tulane.edu

Thomas W. Sherry4024 Percival Stern Hall(504) 862-8296tsherry@tulane.edu

Caz Taylor426 Lindy Boggs(504) 865-5172 caz@tulane.edu

Sunshine Van Bael364 Environmental Science/Israel Bldg.(504) 862-8291svanbael@tulane.edu

EEB Main Office 400 Boggs New Orleans, LA 70118Phone: (504) 865-5191Fax: (504) 862-8706

Office Administrative StaffDavi Battistella, Office ManagerJack Leslie, Operations Manager

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