"2024 Graduate Student Research Grant recipient"
The Biodiversity Institute seeks annual proposals that enhance biodiversity research efforts of UW graduate students, because graduate students are a major engine of biodiversity research and future leaders of conservation.
Successful conservation of biological diversity requires both basic and applied research to better inform current and future policy decisions. The Biodiversity Institute (BI) is providing grants to enhance or expand ongoing graduate student research at the University of Wyoming that addresses how biodiversity is generated, maintained, or restored.
All of the funds that will be distributed are available because of the generous contributions of donors. Donors choose to give to the BI because of the quality of the research we support, and the high-quality communication of that research to the public. As the BI strives to increase the amount of funding available to students in the future from our donors in Wyoming, the Rocky Mountain region, and around the world, we require that proposals communicate the value of the research to the public. Awardees will be required to present their research to the public in a BI-sponsored Science Cafe, as well as 1) volunteer at a BI-sponsored outreach event or 2) develop your own community engagement activity (a menu of BI outreach options is available here.) Awardees are required to attend a science communication training, tentatively scheduled for September 24 and 25, 2024, 6 - 8 pm.
We have two grant options. Please read through the options carefully before submitting your application. Requests for more than one award will be accepted, but must be budgeted separately.
Funding is available from May 1, 2024 to August 31, 2025 (or until date of graduation, whichever comes first). Awards cannot be extended.
Feb 12 RFP announced
March 22 Proposals due
April 12 Awards announced
May 1 Funding begins
September 24 & 25, 6-8 pm Required science communication training for awardees. Awardees must attend both sessions.
August 31, 2025 Last day of funding period
October 1, 2025 Final reports due
Department of Zoology and Physiology
Human disturbances such as climate change and habitat alteration are driving species extinct at unprecedented rates. Given these ongoing threats, it is critical that we understand the mechanisms that support resilient ecological communities. Increasingly, ecologists are recognizing the importance of species interactions in shaping patterns of biodiversity and driving stability. My research explores how groups respond to disturbance and the extent to which stability is driven by interactions across the group versus the presence of particular species. I am addressing this question in the mixed-species groups of birds that forage at army ant swarms. Army ants are carnivorous insects that occur in lowland forests across the Neotropics. To catch their insect prey, army ants perform raids across the forest floor. The ants’ activity flushes large numbers of insects, and many species of birds, mammals, reptiles, and even fish have been observed feeding at ant swarms. Over 450 bird species (that’s over 12% of tropical bird species!) forage at ant swarms, leading to complex interactions between both the ants and birds and within the groups of birds themselves. Previous work suggests that some bird species are especially important in the formation of these ant-following groups, as they provide acoustic information that alerts others to the ants’ whereabouts. However, how particular species contribute to the maintenance of these groups, and how they respond to loss of different species, is not well understood.
Department of Geology and Geophysics
Lake sediments can be used to track the effects of multiple human-induced stressors because they preserve a rich history of past biological communities and conditions from the time they were deposited. My research focuses on using DNA stored in the sediment to assess how phytoplankton and zooplankton have responded to anthropogenic stressors in mountain lakes in Wyoming, Washington, and California over the past few hundred years. This research will aid efforts to anticipate ecosystem transformations and potential state shifts by testing how these three stressors may interact to shape the biodiversity we see today in mountain lakes.
Department of Zoology and Physiology
The goal of the project is to examine how habitat heterogeneity and productivity influence avian diversity, and whether species behavioral and morphological traits are related to their abundance across habitats. With this work, we will have a better understanding of how continued changes in habitat will alter diversity in the most speciose region of the world.
Department of Botany
My research will combine a controlled laboratory experiment with genomic analyses to address how climate induced range shifts affect a population’s ability to adapt to novel conditions. By experimentally shifting the range of red flour beetles, Tribolium castaneum, in laboratory microcosms and then exposing those beetles to novel conditions, we can approximate the effects of a species shifting its range due to climate change and subsequently encountering novel stressful conditions. Understanding how species adapt to novel conditions after a range shift will improve our understanding of how biodiversity will be maintained in this era of global change.
Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources
Due to an unprecedented local and national rise in recreation rates and the highly accessible and striking nature of the higher elevation sites along Snowy Range Scenic Byway which draw increased recreational traffic within the region, establishing the combined ecological and recreational carrying capacity of the area is necessary to properly inform and facilitate corresponding management adjustments such as increased signage, improved educational outreach, and adjusted tourism advertising agendas to maintain the integrity of the landscape and its biodiversity for future generations. this study will include recreationist experience interviews as well as physical and GIS-based assessments of landscape, vegetation, and wildlife impacts imposed by visitors to campgrounds, parking areas, trailheads, and trails near the Snowy Range Scenic Byway section of Highway 130 in Medicine Bow National Forest.
Department of Botany
I am studying two populations of Yellowstone cutthroat trout that face anthropogenic pressures: the Yellowstone Lake population where lake trout (Salvelinus namaycush) were introduced in the 1990s and the Teton River population where a recently constructed dam fragmented the river. The well-monitored lake population represents an opportunity to assess how demographic inferences drawn from genomic data compare with field-collected data, which in turn will guide the use of these genomics-based analyses to understand the demographic consequences caused by the dam on the Teton River population.
Department of Zoology and Physiology
The aim of this project is to examine the extent to which fine-scale, keystone habitat elements (KHEs) disproportionately influence patterns of biodiversity within a sagebrush landscape. To do so, we will document the abundance and diversity of multiple taxa within and away from tall, high cover draws to determine the extent to which these features function as KHEs. Concurrently, we will evaluate the extent to which surrounding human-induced habitat changes associated with natural gas development modulate the influence of KHEs on patterns of biodiversity. Results of this work will improve our understanding of how biodiversity arises and is maintained while elucidating the extent to which human-induced rapid environmental change might influence those patterns.
Department of Botany
When species move in response to climate change, they often interact with communities whose populations lag behind their optimum habitat, thus creating new biotic assemblages and interactions between species that would not typically come into contact with one another. As such, it is unknown if the interacting effects of climatic and multispecies communities on species responses will promote or hinder range shifts. My research examines how the interplay of multiple global change drivers (warming, nitrogen addition, increased snow-melt) and novel species interactions alters range expansions of species from the sub-alpine into alpine ecosystems.
“I am honored to receive the 2022 Richard Baldes Native American Excellence Fund award from the Biodiversity Institute. I hope to inspire other Native American students to go to college and acquire critical training to help advance tribal sovereignty."
Albert Mason - Masters Student, 2022 Grant Recipient
Eligibility:
Grants are available to any masters or doctoral student in good standing at the University of Wyoming at the time the award is made.
Graduate students must continue to be enrolled, with good standing, at the University of Wyoming throughout the duration of their proposal timeline. Funding is available from May 1, 2024 to August 31, 2025 (or until the date of graduation, whichever comes first). Funding cannot be extended.
Research must have ongoing support in the form of existing resources to the student or advisor, access to appropriate equipment, and already approved field or other permits.
the The Biodiversity Graduate Student Research Enhancement Grant Program is supported by the following donor funds:
The Ann and Richard Boelter Biodiversity and Conservation K-12 Excellence Fund to foster excellence and provide financial support to the University of Wyoming Biodiversity Institute’s K-12 outreach and education programs.
Don and Judy Legerski UW Teton Graduate Scholars in Biodiversity Fellowship to support biodiversity research as overseen by the Biodiversity Institute and associated with the mission of the University of Wyoming AMK Ranch.
The Committing to Excellence in Biodiversity Fund started by lead donors Michael and Edith Allen and Patrick and Nora Ivers. To date, over 70 donors have contributed to this fund including a recent significant gift from the Charles Piersall Chapter of the Izaak Walton League in Casper.
"2024 Graduate Student Research Grant recipient"
""I am very grateful to receive the Biodiversity Institute Graduate Student Enhancement Grant. Thanks to this, I will be able to strengthen my master's research in the tropical forests of the Isthmus of Panama to understand the key factors that impact the maintenance of biodiversity and the functioning of ecosystems. The support of the Biodiversity Institute will allow me to carry out acoustic experiments to find out the roles that different species play in the recruitment of…"