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Integrative Biology

Integrative Biology

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Integrative Biology

Science High

Devan Fay Gartman, Crockett High School Class of 2009, amongst the fish tanks of Hans Hofmann's laboratory. When Hans Hofmann, an assistant professor of integrative biology, agreed to take on some interns from a local Austin high school, he imagined that he was doing them a favor. What he didn’t imagine was that both of the students from Crocke...Devan Fay Gartman, Crockett High School Class of 2009, amongst the fish tanks of Hans Hofmann's laboratory.
Integrative Biology

Learning to Hear

Neurobiologist Nace Golding studies the development of auditory neurons (one of which is pictured below) after the onset of hearing. The human ability to know roughly where in space a sound is coming from is so integral to our experience of the world that it’s basically invisible. A friend calls out our name, and we turn to the left, or turn to ...Neurobiologist Nace Golding studies the development of auditory neurons (one of which is pictured below) after the onset of hearing.
Integrative Biology

Salvaging Savanna

Ecologists at The University of Texas at Austin and its Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center have observed, studied and used prescribed fires on local savanna. In the process, the research scientists documented a New England-sized region in the heart of Texas that is losing the biodiversity battle. Now the team is examining what needs to be done to ...Hill-Country-open-savanna-i
Integrative Biology

Predicting intervention strategies for swine flu

Lauren Ancel Meyers, associate professor of integrative biology, is using the Texas Advanced Computng Center’s (TACC) Lonestar supercomputer to predict how the new strain of H1N1 flu is spreading throughout North America and to determine the best intervention strategies. “Our goal is to develop powerful and flexible software so that public health ...lauren ancel meyers
Integrative Biology

Grad student wins $10,000 Granof award

Christian Rabeling, a doctoral student in the ecology, evolution and behavior program, has won the $10,000 Michael H. Granof Outstanding Graduate Student Award at the University Co-op/Graduate School Awards for Excellence in Graduate Education. The Excellence in Graduate Education awards recognize and reward outstanding graduate students for dist...Christian Rabeling
Most Extensive Genetic Resource For Reef-Building Coral Created
Integrative Biology

Most Extensive Genetic Resource For Reef-Building Coral Created

AUSTIN, Texas — A nearly complete collection of genes for a species of reef-building coral has been assembled by a team led by biologists from The University of Texas at Austin. The scientists will use the genetic data to understand natural variations in corals from around the world and how they respond, at the genetic level, to rising water tempe...
Tags:
Genetics Big Data Organismal Biology
Integrative Biology

Sex Isn't Everything

The ants, Mycocepurus smithii, amongst their fungus garden. Photo: Alex Wild. In the end, sex might not be everything. At least, that’s the story for a fungus-farming ant that seems to be doing just fine without it. In fact, they’ve done away with males entirely, a “first ever” for the ant world. Most social insects—the wasps, ants and bees—are...The ants, Mycocepurus smithii, amongst their fungus garden. Photo: Alex Wild.
Integrative Biology

Live-in Domestics: Mites as Maids

Mites not only inhabit the dust bunnies under the bed, they also occupy the nests of tropical sweat bees where they keep fungi in check. Bees and their young are healthier when mites live-in, report researchers from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) in Panama and The University of Texas at Austin. Mutually beneficial cleaning relat...Stingless bee
Integrative Biology

Worthingtons Support Education in Biodiversity

Professor Larry Gilbert and Roger Worthington (B.A. ’83, J.D. ’86) Alums Roger Worthington (B.A. ’83, J.D. ’86) and Ann Worthington (B.A. ’88, J.D. ’91) have donated $500,000 to establish the Lawrence E. Gilbert, Jr. Excellence Endowment, an endowment for the benefit of Brackenridge Field Laboratory (BFL) and research and education in ecology an...Roger Worthington (B.A. ’83, J.D. ’86) and professor Larry Gilbert
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Finance
Integrative Biology

Cool Class: Bug Boot Camp

Katy Kenny decided to take John Abbott’s Field Entomology class in the summer of 2007 for two reasons. One was that she’d heard from friends that the three week “mini-mester” course, which Abbott teaches just after the spring semester ends, was interesting. The other was that she wanted to overcome her fear of bugs. “It helped,” says Kenny, a biol...katy kenny
Integrative Biology

Dry Times

Images from a thermal camera show that the German Arabidopsis plants transpire less and are hotter (bottom three). This contrasts with the German plants that have a key section of chromosome from Cape Verdean plants. They transpire more and are much cooler (top three). Any farmer or gardener worth their salt understands the power of water to giv...Images from a thermal camera show that the German Arabidopsis plants transpire less and are hotter (bottom three). This contrasts with the German plants that have a key section of chromosome from Cape Verdean plants. They transpire more and are much cooler (top three).
Integrative Biology

Troubled Waters: A rare desert spring ecosystem considered one of Mexico's 13 natural wonders is threatened

Sprawling across a cactus-studded valley in México's Chihuahuan Desert is a place like no other on the planet.

Integrative Biology

The Endangered Aquatic Box Turtle

The Coahuilan aquatic box turtle is found in a unique valley in Mexico called Cuatrociénegas and no where else on the planet. It's the only aquatic box turtle in the world. Scientists estimate that only about 2000 exist in the wild and their habitat is quickly shrinking due to over use of water in agriculture, climate change and invasive species. U...
Integrative Biology

Cactus Odyssey

In January of this year, biologist James Mauseth published the fourth edition of his textbook, Botany: An Introduction to Plant Biology. It draws on his more than three decades of research and teaching in the field of plant biology, and in particular on the insights he’s gleaned from the study of cacti. I sat down with Mauseth, a professor of inte...jdm
Amazonian Amphibian Diversity Traced to Andes
Integrative Biology

Amazonian Amphibian Diversity Traced to Andes

AUSTIN, Texas — Colorful poison frogs in the Amazon owe their great diversity to ancestors that leapt into the region from the Andes Mountains several times during the last 10 million years, a new study from The University of Texas at Austin suggests. This is the first study to show that the Andes have been a major source of diversity for the Amaz...
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Biodiversity Ecology Evolution International