News

Despite the current pandemic, the Johnson Lab 2020 Field Team was able to collect host and parasite data from 80 ponds and wetlands in California this summer. Way to go!

Dr. Johnson and Wynne have been given an NSF grant via the NSF-INTERN program! This program supports graduate students in collaborating with non-academic entities on research projects. Wynne will be working with the East Bay Regional Parks District in Oakland, CA to prepare an ecosystem health assessment using amphibians as...

Undergraduate researcher Erica Ursich has recently been awarded a Fulbright Grant to Brazil under the project title, "Snake Assemblage in the Atlantic Forest and the Impact of Edge-effect on Species Prevalence". She will be working with the Institute for Ecological Research, IPÊ (Instituto de Pesquisas Ecológicas) to help begin a...

We are excited to announce a new publication as part of Aquatic Science issue on mountain lakes featuring one aspect of our ongoing research into threats to alpine lake ecosystems : The life aquatic in high relief: shifts in the physical and biological characteristics of alpine lakes along an elevation...

In 2019, we began testing how reduced flushing rates (associated with earlier ice-off on lakes) and increased dissolved organic material (DOM) (associated with encroachment of terrestrial plants in the alpine watershed) interactively affect montane planktonic biomass and community structure. The experiment is currently underway for the first of two years,...

A newly published research article in the Proceedings of the Royal Society: B, led by PhD candidate, Travis McDevitt-Galles, highlights how intensity dependent pathology can be largely shaped by the degree of phenological synchrony between infection risk and vulnerable host stages. Read the full article here.

We are currently piloting outdoor experimental tanks (mesocosms) in the alpine environment near CU Boulder's Mountain Research station. It is our hope that the black colored tanks reflect less sunlight than the beige colored tanks, effectively simulating early ice melt. We have plans to seed the tanks with sediment and...

Since 1992, the Hazel Barnes Prize has been awarded each year to a CU Boulder faculty member who exemplifies the enriching interrelationship between teaching and research, and whose work has had a significant impact on students, faculty, colleagues and the university. Noted in the nomination materials as an advocate for...

Nine EBIO Graduate Students were awarded funding from the Graduate School through the Beverly Sears Grants and our Wynne Moss was one of them! The Bev Sears endowment fund was created to honor Bev Sears in recognition of her longstanding loyalty and efforts on behalf of the Graduate School. Bev...

Please help us welcome Brendan Hobart to the Johnson Laboratory as our new PhD student! Brendan comes to us from the Peery Wildlife Ecology and Conservation Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he earned a Masters investigating the California spotted owl. Stay tuned to see what Brendan will work...

It's offical--Tara Stewart Merrill PhD from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign will be joining the Johnson Laboratory in August! We are very excited to have Tara for a three year Post Doc where she will investigate how among-and-within- species variation in parasite competence affects the dynamic of infectious disease. Tara was...

The Johnson Lab joins collaborators from UCSF Medical School (Nadav Ahituv and Jingjing Zhao) in a study to understand how parasites change the development of their hosts using transcriptome approaches.

A new paper coauthored by Stefanie Johnson at the Leeds School of Business and Pieter Johnson links infection by a widespread parasite to entrepreneurial careers in CU students. The paper explores the connection between the protozoan Toxoplasma gondii and patterns of entrepreneurship in students, business professionals and nations. See press...

In the BBC television show World’s Weirdest Events , the Johnson Lab's research on parasite-induced deformities in amphibians is featured in episode 6, including footage of field and laboratory work as well as a sit-down interview with Dr. Johnson. October 10, 2015 Image by D. Herasimtschuk, Freshwaters Illustrated

In the November 2014 issue of National Geographic , the cover story focuses on the capacity of parasites to alter their hosts in bizarre yet fascinating ways. The accompanying story by Carl Zimmer features a broad range of examples, including the ability of the trematode parasite Ribeiroia ondatrae to cause...