Participating Faculty

The Biological Data Science (BilDS) program for doctoral students is unique in the emphasis placed on evolutionary training, modeling for prediction, and culturally sensitive teamwork. BilDS faculty are accomplished researchers and mentors with interest and expertise in graduate training and diversity. 

Meet Our Leadership Team
 

Participating Faculty Directory

Carol Adair

Associate Professor, Rubenstein School • Gund Fellow

Instructional programs: Environmental Sciences, Forestry, Natural Resources
Research: Global climate change, ecosystem ecology, biogeochemistry

carol.adair@uvm.edu (802) 656-2907

Appala Raju Badireddy

Associate Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Water Quality Engineering, Membrane Separation Processes, Resource Recovery from Solid- and Liquid-Waste, Environmental Photochemistry

raju.badireddy@uvm.edu (802) 656-8443

Bryan Ballif

Professor

Signal transduction, proteomics, neuroscience

Bballif@uvm.edu (802) 656-1389

Dr. John Barlow

Associate Professor

Mastitis epidemiology, veterinary infectious disease epidemiology, zoonotic disease, antimicrobial resistance, global animal and public health, One Health.

john.barlow@uvm.edu (802) 656-1395

Brian Beckage

Professor, Department of Computer Science • Graduate Student Advisor

Brian.Beckage@uvm.edu

David Bernstein

Assistant Professor, Department of Electrical and Biomedical Engineering

Computational Biology, Systems Biology, Genome-Scale Metabolic Modeling, Microbiome, Machine Learning.

David.Bernstein@uvm.edu

Eric Bishop von Wettberg

Chair of the Department of Animal and Veterinary Science • Director of VT Agricultural Experiment Station

Genetics, Genomics, Domestication, Crop Breeding, Evolution, Ecology, Legumes, Germplasm, Conservation

Eric.Bishop-Von-Wettberg@uvm.edu (802) 656-9117

Alison Brody

Professor • Department of Biology

Plant-animal interactions

Alison.Brody@uvm.edu (802) 656-0449

Sara Helms Cahan

Howard Professor of Natural History • Associate Vice-President for Research

Social Insect Ecology

Scahan@uvm.edu (802) 656-2962

Yolanda Chen

Associate Professor, PSS • CCGH Team Leader

How crop domestication and breeding shape insect-plant interactions, farmer influence on evolutionary processes in agroecosystems, conservation and utilization of crop landraces in centers of origin.

yolanda.chen@uvm.edu

Nick Cheney

Associate Professor, Department of Computer Science

Machine Learning, Deep Learning, Meta-Learning, AutoML, Evolutionary Computation, Evolutionary Robotics


 

ncheney@uvm.edu (802) 656-3138

Anthony "Tony" D’Amato

Professor, Director of Forestry Program, Director of UVM Research Forests

Instructional programs: Forestry, Natural Resources
Research: Silviculture, forest ecology, forest management, forest adaptation

anthony.damato@uvm.edu (802) 656-8030

Chris Danforth

Professor, Department of Mathematics and Statistics

Computational Social Science, Complex Systems, Chaos

chris.danforth@uvm.edu (802) 656-3032

Brendan Fisher

Professor • Director, Environmental Program

brendan.fisher@uvm.edu (802) 656-0351

Seth Frietze, Ph.D.

Dr. Ronald W. Pero International Research Green and Gold Professor • Assistant Professor, Medical Laboratory Science

Regulation of gene expression, chromatin structure and epigenetics, transcriptomics of vertebrate development and evolution, metagenomics and molecular diagnostics

Seth.Frietze@med.uvm.edu (802) 656-0569

Gillian Galford

Research Associate Professor

Instructional programs: Environmental Sciences, Natural Resources
Research: Environmental sustainability, ecosystems ecology, nitrogen and carbon cycling, greenhouse gases, remote sensing, ecosystems modeling, land-cover and land-use change, tropical agriculture

gillian.galford@uvm.edu (802) 656-2920

Nicholas Gotelli

Endowed Professor • Department of Biology

Organization of animal and plant communities

Nicholas.Gotelli@uvm.edu (802) 656-0450

Rachelle Gould

Associate Professor

Instructional program: Environmental Studies
Research: Environmental values, well-being, Cultural Ecosystem Services, environmental learning, human behavior, policy, diversity, equity

rachelle.gould@uvm.edu (802) 656-5849

Laurent Hébert-Dufresne

Associate Professor, Department of Computer Science

Complexity science; Complex networks; Disease modeling; Computational Social Science.

Laurent.Hebert-Dufresne@uvm.edu (505) 603-2215

Stephen Keller

Associate Professor • Plant Biology

Ecological and population genomics, Landscape genetics, Molecular ecology and evolution, Plant population biology, Forest responses to climate change, Biological invasions, Applied conservation genetics

Stephen.Keller@uvm.edu (802) 656-5121

Beth Kirkpatrick

Professor and Chair • Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics

Development of new vaccines, many intended to combat waterborne infections

Beth.Kirkpatrick@uvm.edu (802) 656-5822

Dimitry Krementsov, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Medical Laboratory Science

Immunology, microbiology, genetics, microbiome, autoimmune disease, virology

Dimitry.Krementsov@uvm.edu (802) 656-9024

M. Elise Lauterbur

Assistant Professor

Evolutionary ecology, evolutionary genomics, population genetics, comparative genomics, computational methods development, bioinformatics, conservation genomics

mlauterb@uvm.edu

Brent L. Lockwood

Associate Professor

Evolutionary genetics, ecological physiology and protein evolution

bllockwo@uvm.edu (802) 656-1321

Laura J. May-Collado

Assistant Professor

My research interests span topics on evolution, animal communication, soundscapes, marine conservation and behavior of marine vertebrates.

Lmaycoll@uvm.edu (802) 656-4138

Scott C. Merrill

Research Associate Professor • Managing Director, Social-Ecological Gaming & Simulation (SEGS) Lab UVM

Systems ecology, Integrated Pest Management (IPM), social-ecological systems, Landscape ecology, serious games, experimental gaming, animal biosecurity, climate change, population modeling, Monte Carlo simulations, and spatiotemporal modeling.

Scott.C.Merrill@uvm.edu (802) 656-0711

Jane Molofsky

Professor

  • Evolution of invasiveness
  • Population dynamics
  • Coexistence in plant communities

Jane.Molofsky@uvm.edu (802) 656-0430

Brittany Mosher

Assistant Professor

Instructional program: Wildlife and Fisheries Biology
Research: Disease and population ecology, quantitative ecology, conservation decision-making, herpetology, conservation biology

brittany.mosher@uvm.edu (802) 656-3105

Joaquin Nunez

Assistant Professor

Population genetics, evolutionary genomics, computational biology, historical phylogeography

joaquin.nunez@uvm.edu (802) 656-8286

Jeremiah Onaolapo

Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science

Cybersecurity, Understanding Malicious Activity in Online Accounts, Honeypots, Social Network Security.

jeremiah.onaolapo@uvm.edu

Melissa Pespeni

Associate Professor

Ecological genomics, population genetics, evolutionary biology, physiology

melissa.pespeni@uvm.edu (802) 656-0628

Jill Preston

Associate Professor • Department of Plant Biology

Evolutionary genetics of plant development

Jill.Preston@uvm.edu (802) 656-0637

Taylor Ricketts

Director of the Gund Institute • Professor, Rubenstein School of the Environment and Natural Resources

Instructional programs: Environmental Sciences, Natural Resources
Research: Community & landscape ecology, ecosystem services, ecological economics, conservation biology, environmental policy, pollination ecology, biogeography, linking research & conservation communities

taylor.ricketts@uvm.edu (802) 656-7796

Donna Rizzo

Professor • Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Environmental, Water Resources, Environmental & Public Health, Geotechnical & Geoenvironmental, Sustainability & Energy, Infrastructure Systems, Climate Change & Hazard Mitigation

drizzo@uvm.edu (802) 656-1495

Richard Single

Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics and Statistics

Biostatistics.

Richard.Single@uvm.edu (802) 656-8631

Jason Stockwell

Professor

Instructional programs: Wildlife and Fisheries Biology
Research: Aquatic ecology, food web dynamics, predator-prey interactions

jason.stockwell@uvm.edu (802) 656-3009

Weston Testo

Assistant Professor • Director of the Pringle Herbarium

Ferns, phylogenomics, specimen-based research, systematics, taxonomy, tropical plants, Vermont flora

Weston.Testo@uvm.edu (802) 238-6590
Additional Faculty
NameCollegeSecondary DepartmentPrimary Department
Bates, JasonCollege, Engineering and Mathematical Sciences (CEMS)   Electrical and Biomedical EngineeringPulmonary Medicine