We are pleased to announce that the following individuals have been selected as the most outstanding graduating seniors in the Department of Biology for the 2020-21 academic year.
These students were selected based on a recommendation from a faculty member, as well as their stellar performance in coursework and research while in our program.
While we cannot gather to celebrate with them in person, we wish to extend congratulations to them here offer our deepest appreciation to them for their continued excellence in the midst of such challenging circumstances.
2020-21 Honorees:
Abeyewardene, Shalini M. T.
Bondurant, Sophie N.
Bowen, Myah L.
Curb, Tara M.
Druten, Elliott J.
Griffith, Shauna C.
Guardiola, Rosa L.
Hanson-Regan, William
Hardin, Abigail J.
Henderson, Ania N.
Murray, Carly M.
Ring, Cayli D.
Runion, William R.
Russell, Caitlin H.
Schoepfer, Evelyn K.
Scribner, Angelica S.
Williams, Scott W. (Wesley)
Throughout the 2020-21 academic year, the OU Department of Biology will take its popular department seminar series online via Zoom Meetings. The seminars are open the public and we invite you to join us! Please click on the link below to view the schedule of seminars for the semester. Click on the talk title beneath the flyer below to go to the Zoom meeting for this week's seminar.
Click here to join Dr. Amanda Gibson (University of Virginia) : Chasing coevolution: keeping paper with enemies in time and space." Passcode: 07548063
** Talk begins 5/5/21 at 3:45 p.m. CT **
Biology is the study of life and inherently recognizes the intrinsic value of diversity - all lives are unique, valuable, and contribute to the richness of our planet. The community that forms the Department of Biology at the University of Oklahoma (OU Biology) is repulsed by the 400-year legacy of social injustices, discrimination, and oppression and the present-day manifestations of racism that continue to profoundly impact our community every day. The recent murders of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and many other Black and brown people, often at the hands of law enforcement, have been a horrendous reminder of the cost of our complacency and how much work is necessary to have a society in which diversity is nurtured and flourishes. OU Biology condemns all discriminatory institutions, policies, practices, and behaviors that marginalize any member of our community. We stand in support of the Black Emergency Response Team at OU, Black Lives Matter, and Black Visions Collective in their battle against the oppression of Black and other marginalized populations. We not only stand with Black, indigenous, and people of color in the quest for inclusion and equity, but we are also resolute in our mission to provide leadership and promote a diverse and inclusive campus environment through action. We are currently working on a set of concrete actions to improve our department culture, accountability, and transparency, which will be approved and released prior to the fall semester 2020.
OU Biology appreciates, studies, and works to preserve the diversity of life and we will no longer be passive in the movement towards social equality. To make the Department of Biology at the University of Oklahoma a paragon of justice and inclusivity will require our community to work collectively and continuously. We urge those interested in taking action to please contact the department’s Diversity Inclusion and Equity Committee.
The OU Department of Biology is pleased to welcome Dr. Alexandra Bentz, who will join our faculty next fall.
Bentz will serve as an Assistant Professor of Biology in the area of Behavioral Physiology. Her research focuses on how social experiences are encoded into organismal function, leading to long-term changes in physiology and behavior both within and across generations. She uses experimental and observational approaches in the field and the lab that integrate tools from behavioral endocrinology and genomics across scales, from the molecular to the evolutionary. Bentz primarily works with free-living songbirds to explore how these processes function in dynamic social environments.
Find out more about Dr. Bentz’s research at https://abentz.wixsite.com/bentzlab
The OU Department of Biology is pleased to welcome Dr. Daniel Becker, who will join our faculty next fall.
Becker will serve as an Assistant Professor of Biology in the area of Population / Disease Ecology. His research explores the ecological and evolutionary factors that determine infectious disease dynamics in wildlife reservoir hosts and cross-species transmission. Daniel combines a range of approaches, including spatiotemporal field studies of wild bats and birds, phylogenetic comparative methods, theoretical models, and machine learning, to understand how pathogens spread within and between animal populations and species and how environmental changes will alter infectious disease risks.
Find out more about Dr. Becker’s current research at http://danieljbecker.weebly.com/
In order to comply with recent public health statements from our Provost, in consultation with OUHSC and the Centers for Disease Control, our departmental offices are on limited hours of service, and we are not meeting one-on-one with students. Please contact Kyle Baker, Assistant to the Chair, via email at kylebaker@ou.edu or call (405)-325-4821 for assistance. We appreciate your respect of these rules instituted to keep us all safe and virus-free.
