Be sure to check out this Endeavors article which features Kelly Hogan’s and Viji Sathy’s new book, Inclusive Teaching! Find the article here.

Dr. Allen Hurlbert has been featured in an article on The Well titled “How to help endangered monarch butterflies.” From the article: “Allen Hurlbert, professor in the College of Arts and Sciences’ biology department, researches the impact of climate change on biodiversity and the geographic patterns of birds and insects, including butterflies like the monarch. He started Caterpillars Count!, a citizen science project that measures the seasonal variation of arthropods like caterpillars on trees and shrub foliage. At more than 150 sites across North America, anyone interested can conduct branch surveys, collect data and submit their findings.” Congratulations, Allen! Read it here.

Be sure to check out the Well’s profile on Senay Yitbarek in their article “Fresh faces: Meet a few of the College’s new faculty.” Read it here.

John Bruno gave a tour of the Galapagos Science Center to a contingent of Carolina VIPs (including the Chancellor and Provost) as part of the unique field station’s 10 year anniversary last month. John was instrumental in designing and implementing the facility and his group’s research is based there.

Be sure to check out the post about John Bruno’s lab and their research done all around the world on UNC’s website! Learn more about their research here.

“The UNC RNA Discovery Center, funded through the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, will cultivate an inclusive community of scientists dedicated to investigating all aspects of RNA biology, some of which has already been implicated in human diseases and much of which we know very little about.

Led by director Chad Pecot, MD, UNC Lineberger member and associate professor in the UNC School of Medicine’s Division of Oncology in the UNC Department of Medicine, the new center includes UNC’s multidisciplinary group of renowned RNA scientists,” including UNC Biology’s very own Amy Gladfelter. Congratulations, Amy! Read the full release here.

Congratulations to Kelly Hogan and Viji Sathy for being special guests at the ELEVATE conference, hosted at Washington State University. The ELEVATE conference, meant to “engage learners, enhance voices, and advance teaching excellence,” will feature a special lunchtime workshop led by Hogan and Sathy and “will highlight the need for high structure in learning environments, and help teachers to model techniques designed to elicit equity in the classroom.” Read more about the conference here.

Happy 10th anniversary to the Galapagos Science Center! To celebrate this achievement, Todd Vision, Corbin Jones, and John Bruno all gave talks at the anniversary symposium last month. Some graduate students in John Bruno’s lab also presented posters. Be sure to check out the GSC on Twitter. Happy anniversary!

Congratulations to Eric Hastie and Laura Ott for being chosen as a recipient of the FY2023 Undergraduate Research Program Award, funded by the UNC System Undergraduate Research Program. Hastie and Ott were chosen for this award based on their proposal, “Student-Led CURE development and Biology Education Research with the Carolina Biology Education Research Lab.” Congrats, Eric and Laura!

Dr. Laura Ott’s UNC Biology undergraduate mentee, Parker Shoaf presented his disciplinary-based education research (DBER) project at the American Society for Microbiology Conference for Undergraduate Educators (ASMCUE) recently, along with Katie French (NCSU undergraduate). Parker and Katie are mentored by Drs. Laura Ott and Erin McKenney (NCSU).

The presentation was a part of the NCSU STEM BUILD program (funded by the NSF) that Parker and Dr. Ott took part in over the past academic year. They collaborated with Katie and Dr. McKenney to design a tactile teaching tool with guided-inquiry activity on the gut microbiome and the physiological impacts of fermentation products. Dr. Ott and Parker implemented and assessed the activity in BIOL 252 this past spring.

Parker also has first authored a publication on this activity that is under review (Frontiers in Microbiology)!