Photo Credit: D. Tank
Current Lab Members
David C. Tank
Professor, Department of Botany Director, Rocky Mountain Herbarium
PhD, University of Washington Postdoc, Yale University and Peabody Museum of Natural History
My goal as an advisor is to help graduate students become broadly trained in plant systematics and & phylogenetics while they develop as independent researchers by learning to identify interesting questions and the approaches necessary to address those questions.
dtank [at] uwyo.edu; @dave_tank
Postdoctoral Researchers
Graduate Students
PhD students
Malia Santos - Malia completed her BS in Biology at Willamette University in 2016, and started her PhD with me and Jack Sullivan at the University of Idaho, before moving with me to the University of Wyoming in 2021.
Malia is a PhD student in the UW Program in Ecology and Evolution (PiEE). Her dissertation is focused on phylogenomics and macroevolution in both Tricalysia (Rubiaceae) and Castilleja (Orobanchaceae).
msantos2 [at] uwyo.edu; @malia_santos1; santosmalia.github.io
Caroline Brose - Caroline is a PhD student in the UW Program in Ecology and Evolution (PiEE), and joined the lab in 2022 after completing her undergraduate degree at Colorado College.
Her research is focused on the systematics of North American willows (Salix) where she is especially interested in species delimitation in arctic-alpine disjunctions, sympatry, and polyploid evolution.
cbrose1 [at] uwyo.edu; @cbrose22
Erin Bentley - Erin completed her BS at the University of Wyoming and started her PhD woking with Dr. Alex Buerkle before joining the Tank Lab in the summer of 2022.
Erin’s research uses population genomic and phylogenomic approaches to study the evolution of rarity using Penstemon and Yermo as model systems. In addition, Erin is informal education and outreach using transdisciplinary approaches that integrate art and science.
ebentley [at] uwyo.edu
Dan Turck - Dan completed his BS in Resource Conservation with and emphasis in Ecology at the University of Montana in 2010, and worked in the Pacific Northwest forests and in Antarctica before joining the lab in 2018.
Dan is a Biology PhD student at the University of Idaho (he stayed there…) working on our collaborative project (with Jack Sullivan) investigating the comparative phylogeography of the temperate rainforests of the Pacific Northwest.
turc1881 [at] vandals.uidaho.edu; dturck.weebly.com
MS students
Marguerite Trost - Marguerite completed her BS in Botany at the University of Washington in 2021 and joined the Tank lab in the summer of 2024.
Marguerite is a MS student and part of the Rocky Mountain Herbarium floristics team where she is working on a floristic inventory of the Kootenai National Forest in northwest Montana.
etrost [at] uwyo.edu
Dan Coles - Dan completed her BS in Botany at the University of Wyoming in 2024 and transitioned directly to graduate school in the Tank lab in the summer of 2024.
Dan is a MS student and part of the Rocky Mountain Herbarium floristics team where he is working on a floristic inventory of the Bighorn National Forest in north central Wyoming.
dcoles1 [at] uwyo.edu
Former Lab Members
Former Graduate Students
PhD students
Megan Ruffley - Postdoc in Eco-Evolutionary Bioinformatics, Carnegie Institution for Science LinkedIn profile
Sarah Jacobs - Assistant Curator & Howell Chair of Western North American Botany, California Academy of Sciences; www.sarahjjacobs.com
Hannah Marx - Assistant Professor & Herbarium Curator, University of New Mexico; www.hannahmarx.com/
Diego Morales-Briones - Postdoc, LMU Munich Germany; www.diegomoralesbriones.com
Simon Uribe-Convers - Head of Clinical Informatics at Invitae; LinkedIn profile
MS students
Harpo Faust - Senior Collections Manager, Herbarium, Museum of Southwestern Biology, University of New Mexico; https://harpofaust.com
Sebastian Mortimer - PhD Student, Oregon State University; Liston lab
Grahm Johnson - Botanical Consultant
Ian Gilman - Postdoc in Biology, Michigan State University; isgilman.github.io
Former Postdocs
Jon Eastman - Firefighter, Waterloo, Iowa
Maribeth Latvis - Assistant Professor, University of Arkansas; maribethlatvis.wix.com
Anahi Espindola - Assistant Professor, University of Maryland; anahiespindola.github.io