Current Lab Members

David C. Tank

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.

View my faculty profile or CV

dtank [at] uidaho.edu; @dave_tank

Postdoctoral Researchers

Anahi Espindola

Anahi Espindola - Anahi is from Argentina, and completed her PhD at the University of Neuchatel in Switzerland where she studied comparative phylogeography of plant-pollinator interactions.

Anahi is now working on a collaborative project with Jack Sullivan and Bryan Carstens investigating the comparative phylogeography of the temperate rainforests of the Pacific Northwest, and developing tools to identify cryptic diversity in disjunct biomes.

anahi.espindola [at] gmail.com; @Analyssi; anahiespindola.github.io

Graduate Students

PhD students

Sarah Jacobs

Sarah Jacobs - Sarah is from Arkansas, but has been on the Palouse for several years - she completed a MS across the border at Washington State University working on the phylogeny of Hydrangea. Sarah joined the lab as a Biology PhD student in August of 2012.

Sarah is working on species delimitation and diversification dynamics of several species complexes in Castilleja (Orobanchaceae).

jaco5430 [at] vandals.uidaho.edu; @jacobs_sarahj; www.sarahjjacobs.com

Sam McCauley

Sam McCauley - Sam completed his BA in Biology at the College of Charleston in May of 2017, and joined the lab in August of 2017.

Sam is a Biology PhD student, and is investigating the evolution of wind pollination, biogeography, and diversification dynamics of Thalictrum - a clade of ~200 species in the Ranunculaceae.

mcca6713 [at] vandals.uidaho.edu; @samccau; smccau.github.io

Megan Ruffley

Megan Ruffley - Megan completed her BS in Botany at Miami University in 2015, and joined the lab in August of 2015.

Megan is a PhD student in the Bioinformatics and Computational Biology program, and is co-advised with Jack Sullivan. She is working on our collaborative project investigating the comparative phylogeography of the temperate rainforests of the Pacific Northwest.

ruff6699 [at] vandals.uidaho.edu; @MeganRRuffley; meganruffley.weebly.com

MS students

Grahm Johnson

Grahm Johnson - Grahm joined the lab in January 2015 after working as a seasonal botanist in the Payette National Forest in McCall, Idaho.

Grahm is a Biology MS student and an Assistant Curator in the Stillinger Herbarium, and is working on floristics of the High Idaho Batholith ecoregion in the remote mountains of central Idaho.

john8863 [at] vandals.uidaho.edu; grahmjohnson.weebly.com

Sebastian Mortimer

Sebastian Mortimer - Sebastian is originally from Moscow, Idaho, and completed his BS in Biology at Willamette University in 2016. Sebastian joined the lab in August of 2016.

Sebastian is working on his MS, working on the systematics and biogeography of Lamourouxia (Orobanchaceae) - a genus of ~30 hemiparasitic species in the mountains of Mexico, central America, and Andean South America.

mort1504 [at] vandals.uidaho.edu; mortimersebastian.wordpress.com