Dr. Christine W. Miller has been awarded a 5-year NSF CAREER Award for $822,000. "The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program is a Foundation-wide activity that offers the National Science Foundation's most prestigious awards in support of junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research, excellent education and the integration of education and research within the context of the mission of their organizations. Such activities should build a firm foundation for a lifetime of leadership in integrating education and research."

Dr. James P. Cuda and Dr. William A. Overholt were featured in an article by IFAS Senior Vice President Dr. Jack Payne that was published in the Central Florida AgNews.

ABOVE: Dr. James P. Cuda was invited to participate in a UF/IFAS Weed Science Summit held on campus on 18 November. The purpose of the Summit that was organized by Dr. Jason Ferrell, Agronomy Department, was to improve communication across programs at UF and the RECs.  

Dr. James P. Cuda was invited to attend a luncheon and presentation on developing future leaders and solving global challenges by Ms. Betty Castor that was held at Ustler Hall, 19 November. Ms. Castor, who is a former state senator and cabinet member, is the current Chair of the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board. 

Dr. Jacqueline Y. Miller was elected as an ESA Honorary Life Member and received a plaque during the ESA Plenary Session at the 63rd Annual Meeting of the Entomological Society of America, which took place November 15-18 in Minneapolis.

Dr. Thomas C. Emmel and Jade Aster T. Badon along with other 17 participants went on an expedition to the Galapagos Islands, Ecuador from November 28 to December 7, 2015. They found several insects on the islands during the trip such as Darwin’s carpenter bee (Xylopcopa darwini), the cloudless sulphur (Phoebis sennae), the endemic Galapagos blue (Leptodes parrhasiodes), and the endemic Galapagos Gulf fritillary (Argaulis vanilla galapagensis). These are some of the insects that are pollinators of plants in the islands. Currently, there are 13 recorded species of butterflies and about 130 moths species present in the Galapagos Islands. There are also invasive species in the islands such as predatory wasps and scale insects.

We would like to congratulate our 2015 Entomology and Nematology Undergraduate Scholarship Recipients. These students are majors and minors in Entomology and have contributed scholarship, leadership and service to our department.

Katherine Carroll, Andrew Nisip, Johanna  Schwartz, Tyler Shaw, Zachary Kaplan, Alex LoCastro, Grayson McWhorter, Mason Russo, WinDi Sanchez, Gabriella Steele, Andre Szejner Sigal, Sage Thompson, Evan Waite, Paige Carlson, Natalie Grand'Bois, Gabriella Milanes, Sarah Nguyentran, Nicole Ormaza, Morgan Weldon, Katherine Arguez, Stefani Harrison, Mary Karcher, Jennifer Serviss, Rachel Watson, Megan Bernier, Johnalyn Gordon, Joshua Hildebrandt, Shari Linn, Cindy Sigler, Gabriel Somarriba, and Samuel Pass.

Ms. Rachel Watson, an undergraduate OPS Student in the laboratory of Dr. James P. Cuda, was the recipient of an Everett Mitchell Entomology Department Scholarship for her leadership and service to the department.

Congratulations to Florida Mosquito Control Association Scholarship winners: The T W Miller Scholarship was awarded to Catherine Pruszynski, and the Cyrus Lesser Memorial Scholarship awarded to Casey Parker. Each student will receive $2,000 towards their education.

David Owens, a Ph.D. student with Dr. Gregg Nuessly, won 2nd place in the PIE-Insecticide A subsection at the 63rd Annual Meeting of the Entomological Society of America, which took place November 15-18 in Minneapolis, for his talk “Insecticide Bioassays Against Florida’s Most Destructive Sweet Corn Pests.”

We had five other UF students place in the ESA student competition. Here are the other five award winners: David Plotkin, Dale Halbritter, Michael Bentley, Denis Willett, and Xulin Chen. At the same meeting our Linnaean team placed second in the nation!

From the Outreach Coordinator

A big thank you to the students and faculty who volunteered for our November outreach events.

• 2 November- Irby Elementary- Erin Powell
• 6 November- Bronson Middle and High School Career Day- Evan Waite, Erin Powell
• 7 November- Bug Zoo at The Swamp for Vanderbilt Homecoming Game- Andre Szejner, Rachel Watson, Evan Waite, Dr. Rebecca Baldwin, Erin Powell
• 11-15 November- Ocali Country Days- Dr. Joe Cicero, Evan Waite, Rachel Watson, Chris Holderman, Paul Joseph, Lauren Cirino,  Michael Gonzalez, Sage Thompson, Lindsay Wheeler, Brian Ertley
• 21 November- Camp Shands Boy Scout Event- Matt Moore, Erin Powell
• 30 November- Homeschool group tour- Erin Powell

ABOVE: Paul Joseph holds the giant African millipede at Ocali Country Days. Photograph by Chris Holderman.

The live critters are always a hit with children and adults alike. The critters are available for you to check out should you be leading an outreach event. We have doubles of our most popular critters, as well as various native insect species depending on the time of year. We have large wood and Plexiglas cages for viewing our native orb weaving spiders. There is one travel cage and one larger static cage. Please be sure to contact us and review the protocol on transporting and handling the critters if you are not already familiar with it. If you lead an outreach, be sure to fill out a documentation form so your event can be included in the newsletter and we can log all outreach events.