Congratulations to PhD student Helen Payne for receiving a fellowship in Ecomedicine from UCSB, to support her proposal to investigate the effects of participating in field courses on student mental health and academic performance!
Congratulations to Tadeo and Isaac on the publication of a new Ecography paper, validating the use of herbarium specimens to measure the phenological sensitivity of flowering time to climate.
Herbarium specimens provide reliable estimates of phenological responses to climate at unparalleled taxonomic and spatiotemporal scales
Spatial uncertainty in herbarium data: simulated displacement but not error distance alters estimates of phenological sensitivity to climate in a widespread California wildflower
Congratulations to Lisa and Devin, both of whom have just been awarded Mildred E. Mathias Graduate Student Research Awards to explore the process and outcome of natural selection within and among populations of Nemophila menziesii (Baby Blue Eyes: Boraginaceae) in four UC Natural Researves. The titles of their research projects are:
Lisa Kim: "Does seed size evolve? A quantitative genetic analysis of the heritability of seed mass and selection in a California-native annual "
Another Streptanthus paper hits the press! Congratulations, Natalie Love for shepherding another herbarium-based study of the effects of climatic variation -- and climate change -- on the flowering phenology of an iconic California species, Streptanthus tortuosus. Check it out at: this link
Congratulations to Natalie! Natalie R. Love defended her PhD thesis on December 11, 2020 to an international Zoom seminar with 80 attendees! Title and abstract below:
Ecological and evolutionary causes of geographic variation in reproductive phenology and seed mass in the California jewelflowers (Streptanthus, Brassicaceae)
We've just returned from the 2019 Graduate Student Symposium of the California Botanical Society, held at California State University, San Luis Obispo (Cal Poly), where Natalie Love and Kris Peach delivered super-engaging talks about their dissertation research.
Kris Peach reported the results just published in the American Journal of Botany:
Peach, K., and S. J. Mazer. 2019. Heteranthery in Clarkia: pollen performance of dimorphic anthers contradicts expectations. American Journal of Botany 106(4): 1–6.
Check out Kris' investigation of the functional significance of the anther dimorphism exhibited by Clarkia unguiculata, in which she experimentally tested for a long-predicted difference in pollen performance between the vestigial short stamens and the relatively robust long stamens produced by this (and many other) species of Clarkia.
Six undergraduates in the Mazer lab received prestigious awards from UCSB's Undergraduate Research and Creative Activities program to support their independent research during the 2018-2019 academic year. The titles of their projects are:
Ivana Gomez: The effects of long-term vs. recent climatic conditions on the timing of flowering in Nemophila menziesii using electronic records and physical herbarium specimens
Receiving a 2018 CCS Summer Undergraduate Fellowship enabled Kristen Klitgaard, a third-year CCS Biologist, to dedicate her summer to UC Santa Barbara's Mazer lab. Kristen is one of 36 students who earned 2018 CCS Summer Undergraduate Fellowships. Completely supported by donors, each recipient is currently working in one of UCSB's top labs or creating creative works of art.
Kristen Peach was awarded joint grants from UCSB's Department of Ecology, Evolution and Marine Biology and from Giga Science to attend a summer 2018 workshop in Front Royal, Virginia. The 10-day workshop (August 19-30), "Recent Advances in Conservation Genetics", will cover methods, interpretation, and applications of molecular genetic analyses for the conservation of endangered species. Congratulations, Kris!
Dr. Larios (PhD, University of Arizona) has been awarded a UC MEXUS postdoctoral fellowship to investigate selection on seed mass in Dithyrea californica in the Mazer lab. His research project is titled: Evolution in a heterogeneous environment: direct and cross-generational environmental effects on seed size, plant fitness, and natural selection on seed size
Jasen Liu, a fourth-year undergraduate Biologist in the College of Creative Studies (CCS), has been selected as a 2018 Goldwater Scholar. The Goldwater Scholarship Program, one of the oldest and most prominent national scholarships in the natural sciences, engineering, and mathematics, recognizes students in their second or third year who have the potential to become leaders in research within their field. He has been working in my lab since his freshman year, and is a co-author on a paper recently published in Evolution (Mazer et al., 2018). Read more about Jasen at: https://www.ccs.ucsb.edu/news/2018/jasen-liu-third-year-ccs-biologist-named-goldwater-scholar
Dr. Mazer's research as a botanist and evolutionary plant ecologist has furthered the conservation of some of the rarest plant species in California and has influenced the design of habitat restoration efforts.
