Dr. Leigh Johnson, Department of Biology
Academic Objectives
This award supported a multifaceted mentoring environment for students with a focus on plant biodiversity. The objectives were to provide support for two students participating in a focused, study abroad program sponsored by an NSF Partnerships in Research and Education award for which the PI is a participant, and support for multifaceted research that includes training in herbarium curation and contemporary plant systematics. The goal for all participants was to provide training and skills useful for successful graduate study or employment. Because the project was extended beyond one year, this mentoring award serviced more students than originally anticipated. Beyond the PI and Dr. Duane Atwood in the herbarium, this mentoring environment involved one post-doc, one graduate students, Nineteen undergraduate students, and two visiting researchers from Argentina.
Mentoring Environment
Herbarium mentorship focused on the daily needs of maintaining a research collection including accession specimens, processing loans, re-accessioning returned loans, mounting specimens, data entry, and digitization of the collection. In sum, participating students were directly involved in the entire range of activities required for operating an active herbarium that is used both locally and, through loans and visits, to researchers throughout the world. Students in the herbarium interacted directly with Dr. Johnson (principal investigator) and Dr. Atwood (collections manager). Dr. Johnson and Dr. Atwood provided direction and training on a daily basis and, through scheduled weekly ‘lab meetings’, students participated in discussions directed at understanding herbarium services at the broadest possible levels. Advance students with experience are given leadership responsibility to direct the work of new students, and mutual cooperation is fostered to help the herbarium remain on top of its required responsibilities. Through one-on-one time and direct training, participating students were provided with a broad perspective of modern herbarium curation activities, insights and exposure to forward-looking opportunities and activities that our herbarium is just beginning to participate in, and an opportunity to see how curation activities link intimately with modern research in plant taxonomy & systematics.
In the molecular lab, Dr. Johnson and a post-doc, Dr. Lauren Chan, provided guidance and weekly lab meeting to discuss progress, experimental background, and further research opportunities. Several of the students that participated in the molecular lab also trained first in the herbarium, which provided them with background on the interrelationship between specimen collections and molecular research. One graduate students, Mariana Last also helped direct the work of undergraduates in the research lab by involving students directly in their graduate research projects. Additionally, two Argentinian students that came to BYU to learn techniques here integrated successfully in the lab group and provided an opportunity for cultural exchange to all of the students in the Johnson lab, and not just those who were part of the PIRE student exchange (see below).
The four students that traveled to Argentina as part of the PIRE student exchange received one-on-one training prior to departure and then intensive one-on-one collaboration with colleagues in Argentina (Dr. Alicia Sersic) and Chile (Dr. Eduardo Ruiz) for 10 weeks or longer. Participant Aric Wright, for example, arrived early in Argentina and enrolled in an intensive language training course prior to beginning his lab work with Dr. Sersic.
Participants and Products
This Mentoring proposal was successful by enhancing the interaction of a variety of people, all involved in the mentoring process even not all were involved in terms of financial support from this MEG. That is, a number of the participants, such at the post-doc, graduate students, and visiting students from Argentina were important participants even though they were not financially supported by this award.
Lauren Chan (Post-Doc) – Lauren worked particularly with graduate student Marina Last and undergraduate students Kirsti Burr and Lisa Busby (Lisa Glazier) on learning techniques associated with assessing genetic variation with nuclear DNA. A paper was presented at the Botanical Society of America/American Society of Plant taxonomists meetings reporting part of this work.
Johnson, L. A., L. M. Chan, and K. A. Burr. Relationships and reticulation among the vernal pool navarretias (Polemoniaceae) revisited: insights from single-copy nuclear gene PISTILLATA sequences. American Society of Plant Taxonomists meetings, Vancouver, BC, July 2008.
Additionally, two papers (one published, one submitted) were produced from this work: Johnson, L. A., L. M. Chan, L. D. Busby, and S. McMurray. 2008 Nuclear and cpDNA sequences combined provide strong inference of higher phylogenetic relationships in the phlox family (Polemoniaceae). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 48: 997-1012. Johnson, L. A., L. M. Chan, and L. D. Glazier. Allotetraploids in Patagonia with affinities to western North American diploids: did dispersal or genome doubling occur first? Botanical Review, submitted.
Mariana Last (Graduate Student) has involved three undergraduates directly in her research, Analiesa Leonhardt, Tess Blackwelder, and Aubrey Griggs, in work involving comparative DNA sequencing at the population level in Cycladenia. She has obtained funding from the BLM for this work and submitted additional grant applications to various Calfornia Botanical/Native Plant societies. Mariana has also supervised both of these students and Jessica Humes in isolating DNA from a huge population sample of plants related to the PIRE research. Mariana completed her M.S. thesis and is currently re-analyzing the data using some newer methods for incorporation into a manuscript that will be submitted for publication. Aubrey continued in the lab isolating DNA in preparation for a BLM-funded project that is still in progress.
Aric Wright began working in the herbarium and then moved into the molecular lab where he first isolated DNA for an entire study involving a South American species. Aric then went to Argentina for 15 weeks and worked on analyzing the data for the DNA he had isolated. His work was organized and presented at the BSA/ASPT meetings, where he was the lead author. Aric continued in the lab gathering DNA data for a second genus of South American plants. The work below (from the meetings) is in preparation for publication by our S. A. colleagues.
Wright, A. B., A. Cosacov, V. Paiaro, A. N. Sérsic, A. A. Cocucci, and L. A. Johnson. Phylogeographic patterns of fragmentation and expansion of the endemic perennial legume Anarthrophyllum desideratum (DC) Benth. in Southern Patagonia. American Society of Plant Taxonomists meetings, Vancouver, BC, July 2008.
A paper that was aided by Aric’s lab help, but which he did not participate as a co-author has so been published:
Cosacov, A., A. N. Sérsic, V. Sosa, L. A. Johnson, and A. A. Cocucci. 2010. Multiple periglacial refugia in the Patagonia steppe and post-glacial colonization of the Andes: the phylogeography of Calceolaria polyrhiza. Journal of Biogeography 37: 1463-1477.
Aaron Utterback was the second exchange student to S. A., where he worked in the lab of Dr. Eduardo Ruiz using allozymes to study population genetics. Eduardo reports that Aaron’s efforts were exceptional and a publication is in preparation for that work.
Aubrey Griggs and Jessie Riddle traveled in the spring of 2010 to work in the Sersic lab in Argentina. Both students received training before their travel (see Aubrey’s work above) and extensive one on one training in the Sersic lab.
Jenna Ralph, Jessica Mikel, Suzette Holyoak, Sara Johnson, Rachel Call, Tess Blackwelder, Crystal Bush, Daniel Taylor, Lyndsie Jones, Angela Jensen, Taran Esplin, and Parker Huber have been primarily involved in herbarium curation work. On a yearly basis (2008, 2009) they have helped accession over 6000 specimens into the collection,obtain over 10,000 digital images, institute a specimen bar-coding program, and take care of day-to-day curation needs. We are working to improve our mechanism for adding meta-data to the images so they can be posted in the Lee Library’s digital repository for use by anyone with internet access. Prominent among the photographed speciemens are 1500 images that will be used by the PWS 310 course in its curriculum. The herbarium’s digital image repository initiated through this MEG is: http://lib.byu.edu/sites/scholarsarchive/s-l-welsh-herbarium-bry/
In addition to the above activities, several of the students have received training on database construction using FileMaker software and contributed to the construction of the herbarium management software, HerbACE, currently used in the herbarium for managing the collection.