The schedule of Biology Seminars for Fall 2021:

• 9/2 Introduction and orientation
• 9/9 Juliet Morrison; UC Riverside. A role for pleural macrophages in influenza resolution
• 9/16 Kat Anderson; Bard College. Marine climate change ecology: How trying to predict the future helps us understand the world today
• 9/23 Nsikan Akpan; NY Public Radio What is science journalism…and can it save us from ourselves?
• 9/30 Danica Miller; Associate Professor of American Indian Studies University of Washington Tacoma. Self-determination and indigenous health
• 10/7 Jane Lucas; Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies. Soil health in the age of antibiotics
• 10/14 Shannon LaDeau; Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies. Vector-borne disease risk in cities influenced by social and ecological legacies of (dis)investment
• 10/21 Chris Golden; Harvard University School of Public Health. The importance of wildlife declines to global food security
• 10/28 TBD
• 11/4 Gwenäelle Thomas; Duke University. Title – TBD
• 11/11 TBD
• 11/18 TBD
• 11/25 Thanksgiving break
• 12/2 TBD
• 12/9 TBD
• 12/16 TBD

We are happy to welcome Dr. Rob Todd as a Visiting Assistant Professor at Bard Biology!

Dr. Robert (Rob) Todd is a microbiologist, educator, and avid proponent of science outreach. Rob obtained his B.S. in Biology from Iowa State University and a M.S. in Integrated Biology from the University of Iowa. He earned his Ph.D. in Medical Microbiology and Immunology from Creighton University in 2020 and went on to complete a postdoctoral position at the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities campus. On the micro-scale, his research focuses on genome instability and adaptation in the human fungal pathogen Candida albicans. However, he is generally interested in how organisms adapt to both acute and chronic environmental stresses. Beyond typical laboratory research, he is keenly interested in developing curricula and outreach opportunities that increase (and support) diversity and representation in science. He helped establish the Nebraska Science Booster Club during his doctoral work and developed hands-on, low-to-zero cost activities to promote science education and literacy. Rob has worked as a Citizen Science faculty member at Bard since 2020 and is beyond thrilled to continue working with all the talented and passionate students, staff, and faculty at Bard.

This academic year all Biology Seminars are happening on Zoom, as Zoom Webinars, followed by a Q&A session. This allowed us to invite speakers from afar, including lots of Bard alums, which is definitely a silver lining for these weird times!

Speakers for the Spring 2021 semester:

• Audrey Russel ’20, Isa Jones  – who both just finished their senior projects in December 2020
• Prof. Tom Cech, Nobel Prize Laureate, University of Colorado Boulder
• Molly McQuillan ’17, Brown University
• Dr. Min Kyung Shinn ’14, Washington University in St. Louis
• Dr. Caroline Bartman, Princeton U
• Shailab Shrestha ’16, Tufts
• Dr. Marta Shocket ’09, University of California, Los Angeles
• Dr. David George Haskell, author of “The Forest Unseen”; Sewanee University
• Dr. Carlita Favero, Ursinus College
• Dr. Sully Fernandez, The Janssen Pharmaceutical Company of Johnson & Johnson
• Liz Miller ’18, University of Hawaii at Manoa
• sprojjes (tbc)

Speakers that we had the honor to host in the fall of 2020:

• Georgia Doing ’15, Dartmouth
• Nadia Russel ’20, Addie Finch ’20, Eli McClatchy ’20, Gabby Hartman ’20, who finished their senior project in May 2020
• Silas Busch ’16, U Chicago
• Dr. Erica Perez, Xavier U of Louisiana
• Dr. Parris Humphrey ’06, Harvard U
• Prof. Manu Prakash, Stanford
• Dr. Sara Andreotti, University of Stellenbosch
• Emma Kelsick ’17, AmeriCorps
• Prof. Scott Loss, U Oklahoma
• Prof. Mary Lou Guerinot, Dartmouth
• Dr. Melanie McReynolds, Princeton U
• Dr. Daniel Gonzales, Purdue

• 1/30 Introduction
• 2/6 Wendy Turner, SUNY-Albany. Anthrax Transmission in
  Herbivorous African Wildlife
• 2/13 Shari Wiseman, Nature Neuroscience. Perspectives on Scientific Publishing
• 2/20 Felicia Keesing Bard College, Biology Program. The Ecology of an African Savanna
• 2/27 Krista Caballero, Bard College, Experimental Humanities Program. Birding the Future
• 3/5 Michael Gitlin, Hunter College. Carriers of Meaning: Some Research Threads in The Night Visitors, a film about moths by Michael Gitlin
• ——— All in-person seminars below this point are cancelled because of the coronavirus pandemics. We will update this page once we have a better plan. Stay tuned!
• 3/12 Samantha Monier ‘12, CUNY. Changing Climate and the Winter Seabird Community of South Georgia
• 3/19 Megan Gall, Vassar College. Hear, Here? The What and Where of Northern Saw-whet Owl Auditory Processing
• 3/26 SPRING BREAK
• 4/2 Rachit Neupane ‘13, MIT. BMI1 is a Context-dependent Tumor Suppressor that is a Barrier to Dedifferentiation in Non-small Cell Lung Adenocarcinoma
• 4/9 Min Shinn ‘14, Washington University-St. Louis. Allosteric Effect of Single-stranded DNA Binding Proteins (SSB) C-terminal Tails on E. coli RecO Binding to DNA
• 4/16 Erika Crispo, Pace University. Adaptive States versus Evolutionary Processes: A Meta-Analysis Contrasting Conservation Approaches
• 4/23 Colin Aitken, Vassar College. Investigating the Mechanism of Translation Initiation on the Ribosome and Across the Transcriptome
• 4/30 ADVISING WEEK
• 5/7 Student talks (TBC)

Biology seminars are happening every Thursday, at 12 pm, in RKC 103 (the biggest auditorium, aka Bito auditorium)

The plan for this semester:

• 9/12 – Quanita Kendrick, ’17. In The Interim: Navigating the Field Post- Graduation
• 9/19 – Jeremy Kirchman, SUNY-Albany. The Evergreen archipelago: Ecology and Evolution of Birds at the Edge of the Boreal Forest
• 9/26 – Wyatt Shell, ’10, University of New Hampshire. Opportunities Beyond Undergrad: The Evolution of Research Potential
• 10/3 – Alexis Gambis, ’03. If Butterflies Could Speak!
• 10/10 – Michael Hood, Amherst College. Disease at the Edge of Species Distributions: Anther-smut Fungi of Wild Carnations
• 10/17 – Sonya Auer, Williams College. Energetic Mechanisms for Coping with Environmental Change
• 10/24 – Shari Wiseman, Associate Editor at Nature Neuroscience. Perspectives on Scientific Publishing
• 10/31 – Rick Relyea, RPI. The Jefferson Project: Integrating Science and Technology for Enduring Lake Protection
• 11/7 – Paula Checchi, Marist College. DNA Repair: Why Do We Care?
• 11/14 – Felicia Keesing, Bard College. How to Plan a Meaningful Summer
• 11/21 – Daryl Lamson, NY Dept. of Health. Special Case Investigations in Virology: Finding the Unexpected
• 12/5 – Senior Project Talks (tbc)

1/31 – Introduction
2/7 – Jennifer Dean. New York Dept of Environmental Conservation. Prioritizing Invasive Species Efforts: Working Smarter with NYS Tools and Data
2/14 – Zion Klos. Marist College. Water and Climate in Social-Ecological Systems: Collaborations in Research, Art, and Science Communication
2/21 – Sonya Auer. Williams College. Energetic Mechanisms for Coping with Environmental Change
2/28 – Seeta Sistla. Hampshire College. Unexpected Impacts of Land-based Solar Arrays: Novel Habitat Heterogeneity Formation and Its Influence on Plant-soil Interactions.
3/7 – Elise McKenna Myers. Columbia University. The Impact of Microbial Particle Association on Pathogen Persistence in the Hudson River Estuary
3/14 – Sarah Mount, ‘10. New York Dept of Environmental Conservation. The Hudson River Eel Project: . Fish Conservation Through Citizen Science
3/21 – SPRING BREAK-NO SEMINAR
3/28 – Leroy Cooper. Vassar College. Inter-relations of Aortic Stiffness, Microvascular Function, and Cardiovascular Disease and Cognition
4/4 – Dorothy Beckett. University of Maryland. Regulating Vitamin Biotin Distribution:. Implications for Health and Biotechnology
4/11 – Swapan Jain. Chemistry Program, Bard College. Regulation of RNA Using Synthetic Small Molecules
4/18 – Brian McGill. University of Maine. Global Change and Biodiversity: Understanding Our Future Through the Past
4/25 – Cathy Collins. Biology Program, Bard College. Title TBD
5/2 – Senior Project talks: Lucy Christiana, Rachael Mendoza, and Melissa Yost-Bido
5/9 – COMPLETION DAYS-NO SEMINAR

Biology Seminars happen in the RKC auditorium every Thursday at noon. The schedule for Fall 2018:

Sep 13: Scott Chimeleski, Harvard University. Imaging Microbial Activity through a Macro Lens
Sep 20: Alexandra Purdy, Amherst College. Bacterial regulatory networks controlling both host and microbe metabolism: a tale in two Vibrios
Sep 27: Lucija Peterlin Masic, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. New DNA Gyrase B inhibitors effective again ESCAPE pathogens
Oct 4: Jason Breves, Skidmore College. Salt and water balance in fishes: endocrine mechanisms of environmental adaptation
Oct 11: no seminar, fall break
Oct 18: Liza Comita, Yale School of Forestry. Who are the species in your neighborhood? Density-dependent interactions in a tropical tree community
Oct 25: Steve Franks, Fordham. Evolutionary Responses to Climate Change Revealed by the Resurrection Approach
Nov 1: Gabriel Perron, Bard College (title tba)
Nov 8: Vanisha Lakhina, Princeton University. Identifying genes that enhance neuronal health with age
Nov 15: Grace Barber, Pine Barrens. Ants, art, science education, and environmental conservation: A Bardian’s story
Nov 22: no seminar, Thanksgiving
Nov 29: Felicia Keesing, Bard College. How to have a meaningful summer
Dec 6: no seminar, Advising week in Biology program
Dec 13: Senior projects (names and titles will be known later)

Five biology students brought their senior project posters to the Hudson Valley Life Science Group (HVLSG) Spring Research Symposium, which was held at Vassar college this year. The conference was a blast, with about 30 students participating, and a great keynote lecture about frogs and owls (by Vassar professor Megan Gall).

• 2/1 – Introduction and orientation
• 2/8 – Chris Vecsey – Skidmore College – Sleeping on the Fly: Studying Fruit Flies to Learn About Mechanisms of Sleep Regulation
• 2/15 – Kerri-Ann Norton – Bard College – The Influence of the Host Microenvironment on Breast Cancer Progression: Investigations Using a Computational Biology Approach
• 2/22 – Susan Elbin – Audubon
• 3/1 – Olorunseun Ogunwobi – Hunter College – MicroRNA-1207-3p in Prostate Cancer
• 3/8 – Steven Franks – Fordham University – Evolutionary Responses to Climate Change Revealed by the Resurrection Approach
• 3/15 – Carmen Melendez-Vasquez – Hunter College – Myelinating Glia Differentiation is Regulated by the Mechanical Properties of the Extracellular Matrix
• 3/29 – Matteo Farinella – Columbia University – Comics and Science
• 4/5 – Robyn Smyth – Bard Center for Environmental Policy
• 4/12 – Bruce Robertson – Bard College
• 4/19 – Felicia Keesing – Bard College – The Tick Project: Testing environmental interventions to prevent tick-borne diseases
• 4/26 – Arseny Khakhalin – Bard College – Neural network connectivity in the brain of tadpoles that helps them detect impeding collisions
• 5/3 – Student talks

The Biology Seminars (biosem) happen every Thursday at noon, in RKC 103 (large auditorium). The list of speakers and talks this semester:

• 9/7 INFORMATION SESSION
• 9/14 Krishna Veeramah,  SUNY Stony Brook. Ancient European Dog Genomes Reveal Continuity Since the Early Neolithic
• 9/21 Ilyas Washington, Columbia University.
• 9/28 Wilfredo Colon, RPI. Degradation-resistant proteins: Biological, Disease, and Biotechnology Implications
• 10/5 Helen Alexander, Kansas University. Effects of Viruses on Plant Fitness: A Plant Ecologist’s Foray into Plant Virus Ecology
• 10/12 Dave Alexander, Kansas University. The Evolution of Animal Flight From a Biomechanics Perspective
• 10/19 NO SEMINAR
• 10/26 Pia-Kelsey O’Neill, Columbia University.
• 11/2 Jessica Hua, SUNY Binghamton. Poisons, Predators, and Parasites: Integrating Ecological and Evolutionary Complexity into Toxicology
• 11/9 Sarah Dunphy-Lelii, Bard College. The Chimpanzees of Ngogo
• 11/16 Felicia Keesing, Bard College. Integrating Livestock and Wildlife in an African Savanna
• 11/23 THANKSGIVING RECESS
• 11/30 Felicia Keesing. How to Plan a Meaningful Summer
• 12/7 Student talks
• 12/14 Student talks