Current Lab Members

PI. Andy received his B.S. in Biology in 1997 from Grand Valley State University in Michigan. He went on to receive a M.S. degree in Entomology and EEB from Iowa State University in 2000. He earned his Ph.D. from The University of Texas at Austin in 2006 studying the patterns and consequences of marine–freshwater transitions by diatoms. From there he went on to Jeff Palmer's lab at Indiana University where he worked on the evolution of mitochondrial genome size in flowering plants with funding from a NIH NRSA Postdoctoral Fellowship. In 2011, he became an Assistant Professor at the University of Arkansas. Andy is the recipient of a Simons Foundation Early Career Investigator in Marine Microbial Ecology and Evolution (2015) and an NSF CAREER award.

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Lab manager and Post-doc. Elizabeth received her Ph.D. from The University of Texas at Austin in 2010. For her dissertation research, Elizabeth studied the phylogeny and systematics of the diatom order Surirellales, which gave insights into the origins of endemic species in ancient lakes. Elizabeth runs day-to-day operations in the lab and is studying the plastid genome evolution in diatoms. She's especially interested in understanding patterns of deterioration in the plastid genomes of non-photosynthetic species.

Post-doc. Eveline finished her PhD at Ghent University in 2019. Her research was focused on the discovery of cryptic variation in the terrestrial diatom, Pinnularia borealis, which is far more diverse and widespread than anyone imagined. She joined the lab in 2019 on a fellowship jointly sposored by the Fulbright Program and the Belgian American Educational Foundation. In 2020, Eveline was awarded a Postdoctoral Fellowship in Marine Microbial Ecology from the Simons Foundation to support her research on diatom adaptation to low salinity.

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Post-doc. Wade joined the lab in summer 2018. He earned a PhD from Washington State University, where he studyied phylogenomics and floral development in the genus Achimenes (magic flowers) with Eric Roalson. Wade is studying phylogenomics of the diatom order Thalassiosirales, a model diatom lineage that exhibits substantial genome size variation and spans the marine–freshwater salinity gradient.

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Graduate student. Karolina is a PhD student at Lund University, Sweden, where she works with Daniel Conley. She is co-advised by Andy. To better understand how diatoms have shaped ocean silica levels since their origin some 200 Mya, Karolina is working on the early diatom fossil record and studying the molecular evolution of silicon transporter proteins.