Postdoctoral research

I started as a postdoctoral researcher in Dr. Kamal Gandhi's Forest Entomology Lab at the Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources at the University of Georgia, Athens in September, 2020. My work focuses on the impacts of severe wind disturbances on populations of subcortical insects (Cerambycids and Buprestids) in southern GA and northern FL pine forests. See "Research" for more details!

Graduation!

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I graduated with my Ph.D in Ecology & Evolutionary Biology and my M.S. in Statistics from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville on May 7, 2020!

Featured research: 
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My coauthors and I investigated whether the attractiveness of Trillium seeds to ant dispersers could be predicted by seed morphology or chemistry. To test this hypothesis, we ranked five species from least to most attractive based on seed dispersal probabilities, and then determined if dispersal probability was related to seed morphology measurements, phytochemistry, and/or fatty acids. 
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Miller, C. N., S. R. Whitehead, and C. Kwit. 2020. Effects of seed morphology and elaiosome chemical composition on attractiveness of five Trillium species to seed-dispersing ants. Ecology and Evolution. DOI: 10:1002/ece3.6101. 
*Link to this publication available on Publications Tab.

Three takeaways:

1. Overall seed size is greater in the more attractive species, but elaiosome-specific measurements are not related to attractiveness.
2. More attractive seed species contain higher concentrations of key and total fatty acids within elaiosomes.
3. Elaiosome phytochemistry is distinct for all five species, but more similar for the more attractive species than for the less attractive species (Fig. 4, left).
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This advances our understanding of seed dispersal effectiveness in myrmecochorous systems.