All News

Congratulations to Sydney Hope, who was recently awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship!

Sydney joined the Hopkins lab in August 2014. Her general research interests include animal behavior, development, and life history strategies and how they are affected by changes in the environment. For her Masters thesis, Sydney is studying wood ducks (Aix sponsa) to investigate how clutch size affects incubation temperature parameters and how differences in incubation temperature affect stress physiology and behavior.

The  NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) “recognizes and supports ...

From the Fralin Spotlight

Strategizing species conservation: an undergraduate researcher uncovers the eastern hellbender and its habitat

“Go!” Valentina Alaasam yells while quickly maneuvering out of a shallow, cold mountain stream, with a snorkel bobbing on her head and goggles covering her eyes. She’s carrying a large brown hellbender salamander, an understudied amphibian and imperiled Appalachian native. Fellow researchers are ready to meet her at the shoreline—she only has three minutes to collect a baseline blood sample.

Alaasam, a senior majoring ...

Virginia Tech’s newly installed president, Dr. Timothy Sands, along with Vice Provost, Dr. Jack Finney, visited the College of Natural Resources today. While touring Latham Hall with the CNRE Dean, Dr. Paul Winistorfer, they stopped by the Hopkins’ Lab to get a brief overview of the wildlife ecotoxicology research program. On hand to greet him were students Cathy Jachowski, Arden Blumenthal, Sydney Hope, Michelle Beck and Valentina Alaasam.

Welcome to Virginia Tech, Dr. Sands!

The Virginia Science Festival in Blacksburg: October 4, 2014

Last weekend, the Virginia Science Festival featured a host of interactive science activities, exhibits and programs across Virginia Tech’s campus. Members of the Hopkins Lab participated in this outreach event by hosting two wildlife stations near the Moss Arts Center.

“One of our stations was called, “Life of Birds: Form and Function”. We had kids build their own bird ...

Sarah Budischak successfully defended her dissertation at the University of Georgia this summer. Her dissertation was titled: Causes and consequences of coinfection: insights from community ecology.

Sarah found that nematode parasites can influence condition, hematology, reproduction, and survival of African buffalo. Using new molecular techniques to identify worm species was critical, since the two most common species had opposing relationships with host fitness components.

Dr. Budischak has just accepted a post-doc at Princeton University.  Congratulations, Sarah!

Dr. Todd was recently promoted to Associate Professor with tenure at UC Davis in the Department of Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology. Since starting his position there, he has grown his lab to continue pursuing ecological research relevant to wildlife conservation. He currently has students and projects focusing on recovery of the federally threatened Mojave Desert Tortoise, studying the invasion ecology and impacts of non-native watersnakes in California, and understanding host-pathogen dynamics and how they shape ...