JOHN J. SCHENK
I am a plant evolutionary biologist interested in how adaptation of morphological traits is driven by environmental variation, and how this relationship shapes lineage diversification. My work strives to understand the evolutionary processes that have generated the vast number of plant species and their morphological forms. |
Graduate Students
Ellie (Leigh) Becklund
I am a Ph.D. student at Ohio University interested in plant evolution and biogeography, particularly in legumes (plant family: Fabaceae). I am currently studying the systematics and evolution of Neptunia (commonly known as “puffs”), a worldwide pantropical genus of aquatic, semi-aquatic, and terrestrial species, some of which have agricultural and medicinal uses. Through a genomics approach I am evaluating Neptunia species relationships and distributions and correlating environmental factors that led two species to have global distributions. I am also investigating floral sterility and aquatic adaptations across legumes, both common in Neptunia and have likely evolved several different times in Fabaceae. In 2020 I earned my M.S. degree in Biology at Northern Arizona University working with Dr. Tina Ayers, where I studied the phylogeny of the legume genus Errazurizia and elevated one of the species into its own genus, Pictarena. |
Kate (Kathleen) Madsen
I am a doctoral graduate student at Ohio University interested in plant ecology and evolution. I completed my master’s degree at the University of Northern Iowa, working on the productivity and viability of different prairie biomass feedstocks. I am currently studying species that occur only on gypsum outcrops. These exposures create a patchy, island-like distribution of gypsiferous soils in the Chihuahua Desert of North America. Gypsum is considered an extreme soil because it contains a large quantity of both calcium and sulfur that can be toxic to plants. My research will explore the fitness and evolutionary consequences for those species that live on gypsum and identify common dispersal syndromes affiliated with this patchy landscape. Finally, I will predict the effect of projected climate change on species that grow only on gypsum outcrops and identify those that are at the highest-risk of being unable to mediate the effects of climate change. |
Paige Fabre
I am a PhD student at Ohio University who is passionate about plants and education. I was inspired to pursue a career in botany after I spent my childhood exploring the lush rainforests of the Pacific Northwest. In 2017 I received a B.S. in Plant Biology from the University of Washington where I began my research career studying the phylogenetics of Tecomeae (Bignoniaceae). In 2021 I received my M.S. in Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology from The Ohio State University where I studied staminode evolution in Penstemon (Plantaginaceae). For my Ph.D., I am researching floral trait evolution in the genus Mentzelia (Loasaceae) with a special focus on how and why staminodes have evolved in this group. This is an exciting opportunity to evaluate the consequences of floral structures evolving new and novel functions. Website: https://paigethebotanist.weebly.com/ |
UnderGRADUATE STUDENTS |
Nevaeh Prater
I am an undergraduate at Ohio University majoring in Environmental and Plant Biology. A plant’s floral morphology directly determines how it interacts with pollinators and is therefore under strong selection to optimize pollination function, which is one reason why we observe so much variation in flowers. Lepidium is a genus of mustards with flowers that have evolved a specialized structure called staminodes. Staminodes are stamen (the male reproductive structure that produces pollen) that have lost the ability to produce pollen. My project will determine why stamen in Lepidium have evolved into staminodes. In particular, I am interested in detecting whether programmed cell death is responsible for the transformation of stamen into staminodes. |
Riley Rees
I am an undergraduate Honor's Tutorial student in the Department of Environmental and Plant Biology. My interests lie primarily in plant structures and propagation, largely for sustainable agriculture. My current research project looks at the evolution and floral structures in the Caryophyllaceae (the carnation family). I am interested in determining the role that staminodes have played in the evolution of petals in the family. |
Mekenzie Altman
I am an undergraduate majoring in Environmental and Plant Biology with a minor in Chemistry. I am interested in exploring plant morphologies as well as pathologies. My research focuses on Mentzelia (Loasaceae), which is native to the western portion of the Americas, from Chile northward to the northern Rocky Mountains. Throughout this expansive distribution, species individually experience vastly different ecologies, especially along a temperature, precipitation, and soil gradient. How species have adapted to thrive across this ecological gradient, however, is unknown. I am investigating whether Mentzelia species are utilizing alternative photosynthetic pathways, such as CAM, C4, or C3–C4 intermediates, which allow them to persist in desert environments. |
Lilly Osterday
I am an undergraduate Honors Tutorial College student majoring in Environmental and Plant Biology. My research focuses on the effect gypsum soils have on plants. Gypsum is a mineral that contains calcium and sulfur that in large quantities can create harsh conditions for plant growth. Despite its restrictive properties, gypsum soils house a variety of plants that only occur on them. I am exploring how gypsum communities are assembled and how the composition of those communities changes across geographical distances and gypsum outcrop sizes. |
Abigail Croft
I am an undergraduate student at Ohio University studying Environmental and Plant Biology with a Field Ecology focus. Mycorrhizal fungi form symbiotic relationships with most plant species and likely facilitated the evolutionary transition from aquatic to terrestrial ecosystems in land plants. Plants that have re-evolved back into aquatic ecosystems sometimes retain this important mutualistic relationship in their roots, but in aquatics that have evolved morphological reductions from having typical roots to hold-fasts, such as what is observed in Podostemaceae, it is unknown whether they retained mutualistic relationships with mycorrhizae or even how they uptake nutrients from their environment. The goal of my project is to determine whether Podostemaceae have a symbiotic relationship with mycorrhizal fungi. |
Emily Ivory
I am an undergraduate student majoring in Field Ecology. Pollination is a major selective force in floral evolution, where flowers evolve to maximize the amount of pollen it disperses and receives. Not only do pollinators influence floral variation, but the environment can also influence how flowers vary in the number of reproductive parts. I am currently investigating pollen numbers and sizes in different species in the genus Mentzelia (blazingstars; Loasaceae). My current goal is to discover whether there is a trade-off in pollen size and number as it relates to species that diversified into different ecologies. |
Jenna Mcclure
I am an undergraduate student at Ohio University majoring in Environmental Biology with a minor in Environmental and Plant Biology. I am interested in the complexities of ecosystem interactions and how they drive species evolution. My research focuses on floral evolution in Mentzelia (Loasaceae), a genus of flowering plants that are native to the Americas. Throughout Mentzelia, sterile stamens, called staminodes, have repeatedly evolved. We do not currently understand why these structures evolved or how they influence reproduction. The goal of my project is to characterize variation in the number of stamens and staminodes and how evolution has compensated for the loss of reproductive function during the evolution of staminodes. |
Jamie Carey
I am an undergraduate student majoring in Environmental and Plant Biology. I originally came into the lab to complete a project on the optimization of DNA extractions involving cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB), which resulted in two separate publications (Carey et al. 2023 and Schenk et al. 2023). My current project uses RNA transcriptomics to further understand gypsum tolerance in gypsum-affinity plants. Gypsum-soil outcrops are distributed throughout the world and present a unique set of stress factors for plants due to their high levels of sulfur and calcium and low nutrients and moisture. Despite the hostility of these soils, a wide variety of species have adapted and specialized for survival on these soils. I am interested in studying the genetic mechanisms of this specialization to further understand stress tolerance of gypsum-affinity plants. |