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The ASN returns to Asilomar, January 3-7, 2025

Tue, 25 Jun 2024 05:00:00 GMT

The ASN will be returning to the Asilomar Conference Center for its (mostly) biennial stand-alone meeting from January 3-7, 2025.

Due July 15, 2024

The American Society of Naturalists will be going back to Asilomar in Pacific Grove, California, to hold our stand-alone conference – Asilomar 2025 – on 3-7 January 2025!

Have an idea for a special symposium? We want to hear it!

The ASN Symposium Committee invites you to submit proposals for a special symposium. Proposed symposium topics should support the Society’s goal to advance the conceptual unification of the biological sciences and to further knowledge in evolution, ecology, behavior, and organismal biology. Topics could center around important emerging issues in evolution, ecology, or behavior or focus on a pivotal historical paper, tracing its impact and exploring current cutting-edge research inspired by this work.

Proposals should include (1) a title; (2) a description of the symposium topic (up to one page); (3) a list of six speakers, including institutional affiliations, who have agreed to participate in the symposium; (4) a justification for the symposium, explaining why the topic and speakers are appropriate for an ASN symposium (up to one page).

Please submit proposals by email (michelle.afkhami@miami.edu) no later than midnight Eastern Time on July 15, 2022. Send your proposal as a single pdf attachment, under subject heading “ASN Asilomar 2025 Symposium Proposal”.

In line with the ASN's commitment to diversity, we encourage including speakers from groups who have been historically excluded from STEM. Therefore, proposals that include a diverse list of speakers from a range of backgrounds, institutions, career stages, geography, gender, race, etc., are especially encouraged. Further, we especially encourage early career researchers to propose sessions as organizing symposia can advance their careers through building broader scientific networks and a record of scientific leadership.

Additionally, the Society’s selection committee will evaluate proposals based on their potential to attracting substantial audience and stimulate discussion, the significance and timeliness of the topic, and on the topic’s differing substantively from recent symposia hosted by the Society. Applicants will be notified of the decision before the end of August 2025. In cases of financial hardship, requests for assistance to allow participation in symposia can be made to the American Society of Naturalists and will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

Michelle Afkhami
ASN Symposium Committee Chair
Department of Biology
University of Miami
michelle.afkhami@miami.edu

Assistant Meeting Officer

Thu, 30 May 2024 05:00:00 GMT

The Society for the Study of Evolution (SSE), on behalf of the Joint ASN/SSB/SSE council, seeks a member of one or more of our societies to help plan and run our annual scientific conference – the Evolution meetings. The meetings are coordinated by one or more Chief Meeting Officers (CMOs), academics who oversee all aspects of the meeting and who are responsible for final decisions about schedules, activities and venues, in consultation with a tri-society Joint Meeting Committee (JMC) and the larger ASN/SSB/SSE Joint Council. The CMOs also act as the principal liaisons with a Professional Conference Organizer (PCO), whose responsibilities include executing the logistics of conference management, interactions with vendors and service providers, and helping identify and negotiate contracts with future meeting venues.

We are currently seeking an Assistant Meeting Officer who will help the CMO(s) with organization, including interfacing with society councils and other stakeholders, producing the scientific program, and providing academic insight to help guide the work of the PCO. The Assistant Meeting Officer’s primary responsibilities will be for the in-person meeting, although some engagement with the virtual meeting may also be requested. Specific duties will be determined by the CMO and the JMC, in consultation with the AMO. Assistants normally serve a 3-year term and, if interested, may transition into the lead CMO role at some point, with approval of the JMC. Helping run our meetings is an important and valuable service to our societies and our field which is largely a volunteer effort, but the AMO will be given a stipend of $5000/year in appreciation. All meeting attendance costs will also be covered, as well as any other costs associated with carrying out meeting responsibilities.

The time commitment is variable but is expected to average a few hours per week, ramping up at certain times depending on particular tasks and in the month preceding the meeting. Much of the time is spent in electronic communication and virtual meetings, but there are also some duties at the conference.

This position is best suited to someone who has attended several of our recent meetings, has academic organizational and leadership experience, enjoys teamwork, and would find it rewarding to serve the societies by fostering dynamic and high-quality meetings. We welcome expressions of interest; please email these to evolution.meetings@gmail.com with 'AMO position' in the subject and include any relevant experience and a CV. These will be reviewed starting on July 1, 2024, so that the new AMO can work on the 2025 meeting (to be held in Athens, GA from June 20-24). There are no geographic restrictions, nor citizenship or residency requirements, but attendance at the 2025 and subsequent meetings is expected and in-person attendance at the 2024 meeting would be an asset.

The Evolution meeting is the joint conference of the American Society of Naturalists, the Society for the Study of Evolution, and the Society of Systematic Biologists. Since 2022, the Evolution meeting has had options for both virtual and in-person participation, and we anticipate this continuing in future years. The in-person conference is held in a different location every year, primarily in the United States but occasionally in other countries. Recent locations include Portland OR, Providence RI, Cleveland OH, and Albuquerque NM. The in-person conference runs for about 5 days and attracts between 1000–2000 attendees, with oral presentations, posters, a diverse array of social events, and a variety of workshops. The virtual conference is typically 2-3 days, and includes presentations, special symposia, and workshops. Evolution has an enforced meeting Code of Conduct and a strong commitment to promoting equity and inclusion. More information is available on the conference web site: http://www.evolutionmeetings.org, including complete programs from recent meetings. Conferences are run on a break-even basis with careful attention given to minimizing registration costs for attendees.

2024 ASN Distinguished Naturalist Award

Tue, 28 May 2024 05:00:00 GMT

The Distinguished Naturalist Award is given annually to an active midcareer scientist who has made significant contributions to the knowledge of a particular ecosystem or group of organisms and who, through this work, has illuminated key principles of evolutionary biology and an enhanced appreciation of natural history. The winner of the 2024 Distinguished Naturalist Award is Dr. Rachel Page.

Dr. Page is an academic leader who is pushing the frontiers of animal behavior and cognitive science. Dr. Page uses emerging techniques to investigate how animals use sensory and cognitive tools to perceive the world around them. In particular, the panel recognizes her key contributions to bat sensory ecology. Dr. Page continue to develop ingenious techniques to explore the notoriously elusive sensory worlds of bats.

Dr. Page has led work that has shaped today’s views on bat social structure, social discrimination, the social role of male odor, echolocation calls, private and social information use. She has contributed to pushing our understanding of long-term memory and hearing sensitivity. She has shown how species interactions can drive dynamics, including behavioral effects on infection and immune status, how animals learn novel prey cues from other predatory species, and even the effects of forest fragmentation on bat populations. Dr. Page has been able to achieve these milestones under challenging field conditions.

Along with being a gifted scientist, Dr. Page is a truly inspirational communicator. Based in Panama, she holds a monthly educational “Bat Nights” to introduce the public to bats and bat ecology. This outreach is further exemplified by an illustrated book exploring the species Dr. Page has worked with on Barro Colorado Island. Dr. Page has also been recognized for her stellar work in promoting diversity and equity, and is a respected mentor to young scientists.

Dr. Page continues to push our understanding of animal behavior and cognitive science, making outstanding and novel contributions to bat sensory ecology, making her an ideal recipient of this award.

2024 ASN Early Career Investigator Awards

Tue, 28 May 2024 05:00:00 GMT

The ASN Early Career Investigator Award was established in 1984 to recognize outstanding and promising work by investigators who received their doctorates in the three years preceding the application deadline or who are in their final year of graduate school. (Time since PhD degree can be extended by 1 year for each child born or adopted during this period if the applicant has been a primary care giver. Other forms of exceptional caregiving responsibility [e.g., partner, spouse, aged parent, etc]. or extenuating circumstances will be considered on a case-by-case basis.)

We are pleased to announce that this year’s recipients of the ASN Early Career Investigator Awards are Stepfanie M. Aguillon, Kyle David, Valentina Gómez-Bahamón, Chloé Schmidt, and Sheela P. Turbek!

Stepfanie M. Aguillon: Stepfanie’s work seeks to understand how and why reproductive isolation develops, which is key to understanding the diversity of life and how it evolves. She elegantly uses approaches across levels of organization, from individuals to species, leveraging genomics, field collections, museum specimens, and lab experiments.
Kyle David: Kyle’s work is highly novel, spans computational and laboratory techniques, field collections across a broad taxonomic range, and phylogenetic comparative methods. His work on duplications, and the circumstances under which they have been advantageous, as well as on uneven genomic sampling across taxa, has major implications for a range of researchers.
Valentina Gómez-Bahamón: Valentina’s research explores the role of migratory behavior on speciation. The combination of behavioral work in the field alongside genomic, phenotypic, and diversification analyses is creative, and her work asks important questions about the origin and persistence of animal morphological, taxonomic, and functional diversity, with findings that apply broadly across studies of speciation and gene flow.
Chloé Schmidt: Chloé’s research bridges data synthesis, high-resolution remote-sensing, and modern statistical methods, while also having some applications to biodiversity change. Her work has changed how we think about patterns of biodiversity, for example challenging the assumption that all types of diversity increase towards the tropics, and bridges fields and techniques in creative ways.
Sheela P. Turbek: Sheela’s work is bringing a new light to our understanding of speciation, and particularly the roles played by assortative mating and gene flow in that process. Her research occurs at the interface of ecology, evolution, behavior, and conservation biology and uses genomic tools to study what mechanisms generate and maintain species diversity in the face of anthropogenic change. The committee was particularly struck by the applications of her research to conservation.

We are very much looking forward to their participation in the ASN Early Career Investigator symposium at the annual meeting in Montréal, Québec, this July.

2024 ASN Award for Distinguished Achievement in the Conceptual Unification of the Biological Sciences

Tue, 28 May 2024 05:00:00 GMT

Congratulations to Anurag Agrawal, the recipient of the 2024 ASN Conceptual Unification Award. Dr. Agrawal's research exemplifies the central emphasis of this award, and of the ASN itself, in its integration of evolution, genetics, ecology and behavior in investigation of the "milkweed village" – the guild of insects that consume milkweeds, along with the milkweed hosts themselves. Professor Agrawal studies the interactions of varied insects with this plant group at multiple levels, ranging from community diversity, through individuals, to nucleotide variation. The research also spans from macroevolutionary to contemporary time scales, as well as spatial scales from local to continental, in order to disentangle the many threads of coevolution that interconnect the members of this community. In unifying scales, perspectives, and questions within evolutionary ecology through an elegant focus on an iconic group of plant-insect interactions, Professor Agrawal's work is emblematic of conceptual unification.

The ASN Award for Distinguished Achievement in the Conceptual Unification of the Biological Sciences is given annually to honor relatively senior but still active investigators who are making fundamental contributions to the Society's goals in promoting the conceptual unification of the biological sciences.

2024 American Naturalist Student Paper Award

Tue, 28 May 2024 05:00:00 GMT

The American Naturalist 2024 Student Paper Award is for work that was published in 2023 and that was performed primarily by the first author and primarily while she or he was an undergraduate or graduate student. The Editors of the journal, in consultation with Associate Editors, examine all student-authored papers in the journal to select an outstanding contribution that advances the journal’s goals of changing the way people think about organismal biology (including but not limited to ecology, evolution, and behavior) by providing new conceptual insights.

Winner:

Gregor-Fausto Siegmund, David A. Moeller, Vincent M. Eckhart, and Monica A. Geber. 2023. “Bet Hedging Is Not Sufficient to Explain Germination Patterns of a Winter Annual Plant.” The American Naturalist 202:767–784.

In this paper, Gregor-Fausto Siegmund and colleagues test a classic bet-hedging hypothesis for delayed germination of seeds in the seed bank. This is a literal textbook example in ecology used to explain how species can deal with variable and unpredictable environments, but is bet-hedging enough to explain what is going on in the field? Utilizing an immense data set in Clarkia xantiana encompassing 20 populations and 15 years, Siegmund et al. estimate key life history parameters and the rate of germination that would maximize geometric mean fitness. The found that these optimal rates are often several times higher than observed rates, so something other than, or in addition to, bet-hedging seems to be in operation. The authors’ exploratory analyses suggest that the discrepancy can explain density dependence in germination and fruiting success.

This paper is a perfect example of integrating long-term data, experimental work, and theoretical modeling to “change the way people think” about a classic question and system. Both editors and reviewers of the paper were impressed by the meticulous quantification of vital rates that allowed robust quantitative predictions for optimal bet-hiding rates. The paper also illustrates the unique insights one can obtain from long-term population studies across multiple populations, which are increasingly important to understanding how species respond to changing conditions.

Honorable mention:

Noah S. B. Houpt and Rees Kassen. 2023. “On the de novo emergence of ecological interactions during evolutionary diversification: A conceptual framework and experimental test.” The American Naturalist 202:800–817.

In this paper, Noah Houpt and Rees Kassen tackle an extremely interesting question: how do novel ecological interactions evolve? We know from microbial experimental evolution that even a single strain of bacterium, when given enough time, can differentiate into strains or isolates that are ecologically distinct. But we don’t yet know the details of this process: what kind of ecological interactions evolve? Do different kinds of interactions evolve in different environments? These are the fundamental questions that Houpt and Kassen tackle. They use a microbial evolution experiment where an ancestral strain of Pseudomonas aeruginosa evolves in nutritionally simple or complex environments. They propose an intuitive new framework to classify the kind of ecological interactions that evolve based on how the evolved isolates perform by themselves versus their evolved communities in the evolved or non-evolved environments. They show that most lines evolve positive ecological interactions that make communities more fit than individual isolates. However, an ingenious dilution experiment shows unexpectedly that this seems to be driven at least in part by variants that evolved that don’t themselves reach high frequency. These results highlight that there is still much to be learned about how ecological diversity and interaction networks evolve even in “simple” systems.

2024 ASN Presidential Award

Tue, 28 May 2024 05:00:00 GMT

The winner of the 2024 ASN Presidential Award, chosen from among all of the papers published in The American Naturalist in 2023, is “Evolution of a Mosquito’s Hatching Behavior to Match Its Human-Provided Habitat” by Hillery C. Metz, Alexandra K. Miller, Janet You, Jewelna Akorli, Frank W. Avila, Eva A. Buckner, Philomina Kane, Samson Otoo, Alongkot Ponlawat, Omar Triana-Chávez, Katie F. Williams, and Carolyn S. McBride.

This paper truly exemplifies the American Society of Naturalists’ goal of the conceptual unification of the biological sciences, with results of both fundamental and applied importance. The key result is that a subspecies of the yellow fever mosquito has recently evolved to be locally adapted to water containers made by humans rather than the ancestral tree hole habitat. In tree holes mosquito egg hatching is cued by declining oxygen concentration caused by increasing populations of their bacterial food, but egg hatching in the recently evolved subspecies occurs at the higher oxygen concentrations found in artificial water containers. The paper combines geographically widespread sampling, genetics, a common garden design, and detailed laboratory and field experiments. It also has a very diverse set of authors, including several undergraduates and collaborators from Africa, Asia, and South America.