The Miller Lab Summer 2022
Christine W. Miller cwmiller@ufl.edu
Dr. Miller is an Associate Professor in the Entomology and Nematology Department at the University of Florida, Gainesville. She earned a B.A. from Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT in 1998 and a Ph.D. in Organismal Biology and Ecology from the University of Montana in 2007. Dr. Miller works on the evolution of morphology and behavior, particularly in the field of sexual selection. She uses insects to understand the fundamentals of why animals do what they do and are shaped the way they are shaped. Some of her recent honors and awards include a $1.2M award (2022-2026) from the National Science Foundation (NSF), the NSF CAREER Award (2016-2022), the national Excellence in College and University Teaching Award from the USDA (2017), the University of Florida College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Undergraduate Teacher of the Year Award (2018), and she was recognized as an Honorary Term Professor by the University of Florida twice, in 2016 and 2019. In the 2022-2023 academic year, Dr. Miller is on sabbatical at the University of Cambridge.
Curriculum vitae
 Benjamin Jarrett
Ben started at Durham University for his BSc in Zoology and then moved swiftly into studying insects with a MSc in Entomology from Imperial College London. His PhD at the University of Cambridge focused on the role of parental care in driving evolutionary change. He followed his PhD with a postdoc at Michigan State University exploring adaptation of parasitoid wasps to novel hosts. Ben joined the Miller Lab in 2020 with funding from the Human Frontiers Science Program where he will be investigating how coreids adapt to the social environment (e.g. male-male competition) and how this influences host plant use.
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 Sam Zlotnik
Sam completed a B.S. in Molecular Environmental Biology and a B.A. in Psychology at the University of California Berkeley followed by an M.S. in Biological Sciences at Purdue University. They joined the Miller Lab as a Ph.D. student in 2018 and began studying feeding adaptations in leaf-footed bugs. Their dissertation research focuses on phenotypic plasticity in mouthpart size as well as social feeding behaviors. Sam enjoys writing about a broad range of scientific and environmental topics for general audiences and accepted a AAAS Mass Media Fellowship to work at the Smithsonian Magazine for Summer 2022.
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 James Boothroyd
James completed his B.S. at Northern Arizona University in 2017 and joined us as a Ph.D. student in the fall of 2020. James has a great interest in invertebrate biology and behavior, especially as it relates to evolution and sexual selection. In the Miller Lab James is working on the evolution of phenotypic plasticity in testes and weapons. He balances his demanding research schedule with leadership, serving as the Supervisory TA for the Principles of Entomology laboratory sections, and teaching of his own laboratory section.
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 Steven Smit
Steve is a proud member of the the Huron Potawatomi tribe who earned his B.S. at the University of Michigan in 2018 with a major in ecology and evolutionary biology and a minor in applied statistics. For his M.S. thesis, Steve found that autotomy in leaf-footed bugs has a remarkably small impact on female fitness-related traits.
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 Yichen Li
Yichen completed her B.S. at University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2022, with majors in Evolutionary Biology and Psychology, and a certificate in Environmental Studies. She joined the Miller Lab as a M.S. student in the fall of 2022. Yichen is mesmerized by insect behavioral ecology broadly, and specifically interested in sexual selection and the influence of social context on leaf-footed bugs. She began investigating the effect of male-male competition on female injuries in Summer 2022. Besides doing sciences, she also loves macro photography and insect drawing in daily life.
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 Gayatri Raina
Gayatri joins us as a research intern in Summer 2022. Gayatri is working to complete her BS/MS in Biology from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Mohali in 2024. Her research interests lie mainly in evolution, behaviour and theoretical biology. As a research intern in Summer 2022, Gayatri is working together with Yichen Li and Ben Jarrett to investigate the influence of nutrition on the injuries sustained from male-male combat in leaf-footed bugs. In her free time, Gayatri enjoys playing instruments and reading.
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