January 2010
Faculty News
Dr. Christine Miller was invited to serve as an Editorial Board Member and a Reviewing Editor for the Journal of Evolutionary Biology for the years 2010-2014.
Dr. Norman Leppla became an ESA Fellow at the Entomological Society of America (ESA) annual meeting in Indianapolis during 13-16 December. This award was in recognition of his efforts "in the field of integrated pest management, emphasizing biological control and associated insect rearing techniques."
Dr. Marc Branham served as the 2009 President of the Systematics, Evolution and Biodiversity Section of the ESA. His term of office expired at the Section's final business meeting at the recent annual meeting. He also served on the Program Committee for the meeting. Dr. Branham recently was elected Councilor of the Coleopterists Society for 2010-2011.
Thomas Fasulo was pleasantly surprised to discover that the State of Georgia has authorized our CD-ROM-based training tutorials for licensed pesticide applicator recertification for several years. This makes five such states, including Florida, that use these tutorials for applicator license renewal and technician training. The Georgia Pest Control Association initiated this through their state's structural oversight board, but Fasulo found out when the board that recertifies other types of pesticide licenses also approved the tutorials.
Student News
Ph.D. student Thomas Chouvenc received the 2009 Nutting Award, presented by the International Union for the Study of Social Insects- North American Section. The William L. and Ruth D. Nutting Award is named in honor of the late Bill Nutting, an outstanding termite biologist who made major contributions to termite biology, both through his own research and mentoring of students, and in honor of Ruth Nutting for her support of Bill’s work."
At the recent ESA meeting, Thomas Chouvenc received 1st place for his presentation in "Structural, Veterinary and Public Health Systems" with "Differential cellular encapsulation in six termite species against the infection of Metarhizium anisopliae."
The Entomology and Nematology Student Organization (ENSO) organized a practice and comment session on December 10th for students preparing to present at the annual ESA conference. Eight students presented 10 to 12 minute talks on their research. A $100 travel grant was gifted on behalf of ENSO for the best presentation, as deemed by a committee of professors. While all eight talks were without a doubt excellent, we would like to congratulate Sharon Clemmensen, the winner of the travel grant. We would also like to thank our panel of judges - Drs. James Maruniak, Norman Leppla, and Marc Branham - for all of their help in making this session possible. - Dan Fitzpatrick, ENSO President
Ph.D. students Margie Pfiester and Matt Lehnert were married on 11 December 2009. With 100+ graduate students, we should be surprised this doesn't happen more often. Did either of them (or both?) take Dr. Miller's course on Sexual Selection?
Ph.D. student Roxanne Burrus won first prize at the ESA's Student Competition for the President's Prize in the Structural, Veterinary, and Public Health Systems section's Veterinary and Stored Product Pest's grouping. Her co-advisors are Drs. Jerry Hogsette and Phillip Kaufman.
Ph.D. student Harsimran Rosie Gill received a $300 CALS James Davidson Graduate Student Scholarship to attend the recent ESA meeting.
Ph.D. student Teresia Nyoike received the first prize in the student poster competition (Ecology section) at the ESA meeting.
Alumni News
Three recent graduates of our department were honored by the Entomological Society of America for their achievements at its recent meeting.
Eugenio Nearns (M.S. '06) is the 2009 recipient of the J.G. Edwards Prize. This prize is awarded annually by the Coleopterists Society for the best published paper dealing with the systematics or biology of Coleoptera based upon a master's thesis published in the preceding calendar year. The paper of note is: Nearns EH, Branham MA. 2008. Revision and phylogeny of the tribes Curiini LeConte and Plectromerini Nearns & Branham, new tribe (Coleoptera: Cerambycidae: Cerambycinae). Memoirs of the American Entomological Society 47: 1-117.
Publications
Chouvenc T, Su N-Y, Robert A. 2009. Susceptibility of seven termite species (Isoptera) to the entomopathogenic fungus Metarhizium anisopliae. Sociobiology 54: 723–748.
Obenauer PJ, Buss LJ, Kaufman PE. 2009. Utilizing Auto-montage™ technology for identifying field-collected container-inhabiting mosquito eggs. Journal of the American Mosquito Control Association 25: 517-520.
Stelinski LL, Czokajlo D. 2010. Suppression of citrus leafminer, Phyllocnistis citrella, with an attract-and-kill formulation. Entomologia Experimentalis et Applicata 134: 69-77.
Watts SL, Fitzpatrick DM, Maruniak JE. 2009. Blood meal identification from Florida mosquitoes (Diptera: Culicidae). Florida Entomologist 92: 619-622.
Nyoike TW, Liburd OE. 2010. Effect of living (buckwheat) and UV reflective mulches with and without imidacloprid on whiteflies, aphids and marketable yields of zucchini squash. International Journal of Pest Management 56: 31-39.
Weibelzahl E, Liburd OE. 2009. Epizootic of Acalitus vaccinii (Acari: Eriophyidea) caused by Hirsutella thompsonii on southern highbush blueberry in north-central Florida. Florida Entomologist 92: 601-607.
Liburd OE. 2009. Fostering collaboration and linkages with our Latin American and Caribbean neighbors. Florida Entomologist 92: 689-690.
Cuda JP. 2009. Book review: Muniappan, Reddy, GVP, Raman A. (eds.). Biological Control of Tropical Weeds using Arthropods. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. Florida Entomologist 92: 675-676.
Cuda JP, Medal JC, Gillmore JL, Habeck DH, Pedrosa-Macedo JH. 2009. Fundamental host range of Pseudophilothrips ichini sensu lato (Thysanoptera: Phlaeothripidae), a candidate biological control agent of Schinus terebinthifolius (Sapindales: Anacardiaceae) in the USA. Environmental Entomology 38: 1642-1652.
Manrique V, Cuda JP, Overholt WA. 2009. Effect of herbivory on growth and biomass allocation of Brazilian peppertree (Sapindales: Anacardiaceae) seedlings in the laboratory. Biocontrol Science and Technology 19: 657-667.
Bybee SM, Zaspel JM, Beucke KA, Scott CH, Smith B, Branham MA. 2010. Is molecular data supplanting morphological data in modern phylogenetic studies? Systematic Entomology 35: 2-5.
Spring 2010 Entomology and Nematology Seminars
The seminar series is held on Thursday afternoons in room 1031. Refreshments are served at 3:45 pm, and the seminar begins at 4:00 pm. For a listing of the speakers and their presentations for Spring 2010, see the department's seminar Web site at http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/seminar/.
Meetings and Presentations
On 16-18 November, Drs. Alejandro Arévalo and Jawwad Qureshi, of the UF/IFAS Southwest Florida Reseach and Education Center in Immokalee, were invited to present their research at the Citrus Huanglongbing and Potato Zebra Chip conference in McAllen, Texas. Dr. Qureshi spoke on "Integrating biological control in the management program for Asian citrus psyllid, Diaphorina citri (Hemiptera: Psyllidae)," and Dr. Arevalo discussed the "Efficiency of three monitoring methods for Asian citrus psyllid, Diaphorina citri Kuwayama, populations on commercial and research plots in Florida" and an "Update on the Citrus Greening Bibliographical Database." The database now has over 1761 references, 789 of which have links to the original article. To add an article that is not yet linked, or if you would like to contribute information, have questions or provide suggestions, please contact them at Greening.Database@ifas.ufl.edu.
Dr. James P. Cuda was invited to participate in a Strategic Management of Invasive Species in the Southeastern United States workshop sponsored by the Department of Defense. The workshop, held in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 7-11 December, provided participants with the knowledge and resources which will enable them to improve land stewardship by building partnerships and effectively addressing invasive species problems with an emphasis on terrestrial plants of the southeast. Cuda gave a presentation "Biological control for invasive plant management in the Southeast."
Dr. Marjorie A. Hoy attended the ESA annual meeting and presented an invited symposium presentation on "Classical biological control of the red palm mite."
While attending the ESA meeting, Dr. James P. Cuda presented the poster "Biology and fundamental host range of the stem boring weevil Apocnemidophorus pipitzi (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), a new candidate for biological control of Brazilian peppertree, Schinus terebinthifolius." It was co-authored by Judy Gillmore and Drs. Julio Medal and William Overholt.
Ph.D. student Clare Scott presented "The contribution of morphology to a phylogenetic analysis of Crambidia (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae: Arctiinae): a preliminary investigation" at the ESA meeting.
Grants
Ph.D. students Teresia Nyoike and Elena Rhodes received $250 travel grants from the Graduate Student Council to attend the ESA meeting.
Graduate students Teresia Nyoike, Elena Rhodes and Craig Roubos received $200 travel grants from the Florida Entomological Society to attend the ESA meeting.
Newsletter Minutiae
Thomas Fasulo is the newsletter editor. Departmental faculty, staff, students and alumni can submit news anytime to fasulo@ufl.edu. Issues usually are published by early mid-month. Submit items for an issue by the 7th of that month.
UF-Bugnews-L listserv subscribers receive notices when issues are posted on the newsletter Web site at http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/news, which has instructions for subscribing and unsubscribing. Pam Howell and Nancy Sanders review the newsletter for errors. Thomas Fasulo does the HTML coding.
In the last 12 months, the newsletter Web site recorded 115,154 page views.
January 2010.