Eastern Michigan University Department of Biology

While up North, Kelsey Mitchell and Maggie Hanes enjoyed the most spectacular spring flora display in Michigan! Our timing could not have been better.

Kelsey Mitchell and Maggie Hanes started documenting biodiversity at the Parsons Center for the study of Arts and Science this week. We collected 50(!) species of plants to be deposited in the EMC herbarium and added loads of observations to a new iNaturalist project.

To celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, we are hiding shamrock plants in the courtyard between Mark Jefferson and Hover Hall! Come out and get a free plant (please take just one)!! One plant has a special surprise. Good Luck!! 🍀

https://www.facebook.com/153322128633061/posts/965691197396146/

This looks like an amazing (entirely virtual) conference for students!

This event is free but requires that you register by January 15.

What to expect:
-Biology and paleontology career shadowing
-Opportunities and resources tabling session
-Student research poster session
-Panel on careers in the biological sciences
-Workshops on research opportunities, applying to college and graduate school, and other professional development topics
-Networking time with researchers, graduate students, graduate school advisors, and local professionals
-Evening social events

Here's the agenda: https://www.idigtrio.org/2021agenda

New year, new you! There is still time to register for the FREE, virtual iDigTRIO Biological Sciences Career Conference (Feb 11-12). This event is for undergrad & high school students. Visit https://idigtrio.org to register & to see the agenda, speakers & more!

Students check out this exciting opportunity! Looks like its going to be great!

Registration is open and we are accepting research poster abstracts for the iDigTRIO Biological Career Conference! This FREE conference will take place entirely virtually February 11–13, 2021.
Find out more and register here: https://www.idigtrio.org/

The Mission of the iDigTRIO Conference is to provide opportunities to explore careers and graduate programs in the biological sciences to first generation, limited income and underrepresented students (Black, Latinx, Indigenous, other students of color, and students with disabilities).

Registration is open until January 15th, 2021.

What Now? Students invited to a conversation with EMU professors on the aftermath of the 2020 election at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 5 After the voting closes, Eastern Michigan University faculty members invite EMU students to come to discuss their thoughts, hopes, and concerns for the future. 

An exceptional example of how our faculty, staff and students are getting outside to learn during this trying semester!

Slugs, snakes and salamanders, oh my! Cara Shillington’s biology classes at Eastern Michigan University enjoy distinct outdoor explorations YPSILANTI – Holding a Leopard Slug. Reaching out to wrangle and grab a snake for your classmates. Seeing the subtleties of salamanders.

Eastern Michigan University senior Jacquelyn Roberts awarded prestigious Graduate Research Fellowship to pursue doctoral studies in biochemistry YPSILANTI – Jacquelyn Roberts, an Eastern Michigan University senior majoring in biochemistry, has been awarded a Graduate Research Fellowship Program award by the National Science Foundation.

Biology’s own Tamara Tucker-Ibarisha is changing our community and the world with her creativity and passion. We are lucky to work with her.

EMU lecturer Tamara Tucker-Ibarisha promotes diverse children’s literature and positive representations of black men with Black Men Read program YPSILANTI - “When you’re passionate and you see a change that you’d like to see in the world, it’s hard not to be the person who’s like ‘Okay, this needs to exist, so let’s just create it.’”

Now blooming in the EMU Greenhouse!

The story goes that Darwin was sent a sample of the flower in 1862. Upon seeing its long, narrow, nectar tube, he predicted that there must be an insect with a very long proboscis (a tongue-like part) that could reach deep within the hollow space to “drink” the nectar at the bottom. In so doing the insect would bump into the flower’s sticky pollen, enabling its transfer from one flower to another.

But no such insect had ever been seen in Madagascar where the orchid came from, or anywhere else. And many scientists believed Darwin was wildly wrong, so he was ridiculed for his prediction.

Nonetheless, Darwin firmly believed that the star orchid had developed its long nectar tube as an adaptation to help ensure pollination because orchid flowers have their pollen in a single mass and cannot disperse it as other flowers do. The orchids need their specific insect pollinators to survive.

Sure enough, about four decades after Darwin’s prediction, an insect with the exact physical characteristics that Darwin had predicted was discovered. Called the Hawk Moth, its scientific name is Xanthopan morganii praedicta, which is Latin for ‘predicted moth’ in honor of Darwin. (Watch a nighttime video below showing the moth interacting with the orchid.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMVN1EWxfAU