Postdoc University of California, Berkeley
Ph.D. Cornell University
A.B. Dartmouth College
Dustin is a behavioral and evolutionary ecologist who studies the causes and consequences of family-living in animals. He is interested in social behavior, mating systems, and sexual selection among other topics. He currently works primarily on African starlings at the Mpala Research Centre in Kenya, and snapping shrimp in the Florida Keys, USA. He has conducted fieldwork throughout Africa and Central America, as well as in the Galapagos Islands working on birds, mammals, insects, reptiles, and crustaceans. He combines intensive field work and modeling with a variety of lab techniques, including molecular genetics, endocrinology, immunology, and stable isotope analysis. Dustin received an A.B. from Dartmouth College in 1999, followed by a year in the Galapagos Islands as a Reynolds Scholar conducting independent research. He received his Ph.D. in 2006 as a Howard Hughes Predoctoral Fellow at Cornell University. He then moved to the University of California, Berkeley as a Miller Research Fellow. In 2009, he joined the faculty at Columbia University.
Diploma Kenya Wildlife Service Training Institute
Wilson has been working on the African starling project since 2001. He left for a year and a half in 2006 to complete his Diploma in Wildlife Management at the Kenya Wildlife Service Training Institute. He has also been an integral part of many of the collection trips that we conducted across Kenya to collect starlings.
D.M.V Cornell University
B.A. Cornell University
Brynn worked on the starling phylogeny and helped develop microsatellites for snapping shrimp as an undergraduate from 2005 to 2007. She participated in the Kenya Field Course in Summer 2005 and returned to Kenya in 2007 to work on the African starling project.
Godffrey grew up not far from Mpala and began working on the African starling project 2007 after graduating from high school.
Gabriel is a tour guide at the Loisaba Ranch in Laikipia, Kenya. He worked on the African starling project from 2003 to 2005 and grew up not far from the Mpala Research Centre.
Research Associates
B.A. Cornell University
Tyler participated in the Kenya Field Course in Summer 2005 and returned to Kenya in 2008 to work on the African starling project. He is currently working as an ecotour guide in the Pacific Northwest.
Lab Alumni
Unfortunately, Julius passed away in 2009 while working as a tour guide in Kenya. He helped on the African starling project in 2002, the second year of the study and was instrumental in getting the study off the ground.
Postdoc University of California, Davis and San Diego
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley
M.S. University of Texas at Arlington
B.A. Boston College
Becca studies neural plasticity in European starlings to understand how the size and quantity of neuropeptides associated with reproduction are influenced by the social and ecological environment. In superb starlings, she is examining neural plasticity in relation to the adoption of different breeding roles.
Postdoc University of Chicago
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley
B.A. Lewis & Clark College
Dan studies the neuronal mechanisms of pattern learning and recognition in European starlings. In superb starlings, he is examining vocal communication in to understand if song might be used for individual recognition, and if it is related to social status and different breeding roles.
Visitors
Principal Investigator
Dustin Rubenstein
Rebecca Calisi
Daniel Meliza
Wilson Nderitu
Godffrey Manyaas
Tyler Davis
Gabriel Rana
Brynn McCleery
Julius Ronjore
Rubenstein Lab
behavior • evolution • ecology
Graduate Students
James Kealey
Ph.D. program Columbia University (started Fall 2009)
B.A. University of California, Berkeley
James is interested in the evolution of social behavior in marine crustaceans. He has studied marine ecology along the California coast and on Australia’s great barrier reef. James is an AAUS certified diver and will put the skill to good use during his PhD research. He hopes to study eusociality in sponge-dwelling snapping shrimp by combining field and lab experiments with molecular studies. James is also interested in understanding the genetic basis of social behavior and may use the diversity of social systems among snapping shrimp species as a model system to study the the evolution of sociality and the maintenance of reproductive skew in a comparative genomic framework.
Postdocs
Melissa Mark
Postdoc Columbia University
Ph.D. Stony Brook University
B.A. University of California, Santa Cruz
Melissa studies the mating behavior and the role of brood parasitism in two species of Thryothorus wrens in an agro-forest landscape in Nicaragua. She was awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship and a Fulbright Fellowship for her PhD work at Stony Brook University. For her postdoc, she will examine how alternative stressors (including the role of brood parasitism) interact to impact reproductive success and population persistence in the two wren species. Melissa was awarded a 3-year NSF Minority Postdoctoral Research Fellowship for her postdoctoral work.
Sara Keen
M.A. Columbia University
M.S. University of Florida
B.S. University of Florida
Sara studied vocal communication and the mechanisms of kin recognition in cooperatively breeding superb starlings. She found that starlings encode identity information in flight calls and that social groups use different calls.
Undergraduate Students
Columbia University (E3B) ’13
Ben is interested in evolutionary game theory. He will be studying reproductive skew in social snapping shrimp and hopes to combine genetic studies of skew, theoretical modeling of shrimp societies, and experimental manipulations in captive populations.
Ben Eckersley
Jeremy Law
Caitlin Dean
Columbia University (E3B) ’12
Caitlin is studying the relationship between superb starling nest site selection and acacia ant aggressiveness for her senior thesis. She is also examining the brood parasitism and avian malaria in Nicaraguan wrens.
M.A. candidate Columbia University
B.A. Columbia University
Jeremy will be studying the mechanisms of kin recognition in relation to colony defense in social snapping shrimp. He is studying mechanisms of kin recognition in snapping shrimp.
Columbia University (E3B) ’12
Julia is interested in the molecular ecology of birds. She has previously worked in the Ornithology Department at the American Museum of Natural History. She is studying female song in superb starlings to look at patterns of dimorphism in this tropical species.
Julia Pilowsky
Nathan Bailey
Columbia University (E3B) ’12
Nathan is interested in kinship and helping behavior. He is developing microsatellite markers in snapping shrimp to study kin structure in social groups.
Jordan Hollarsmith
Columbia University (E3B) ’12
Jordan is interested in the effect of ecosystem change on organisms. She has been developing microsatellite markers in three species of sponge-dwelling snapping shrimp to use in studies of genetic structure and parentage.
Lea Pollack
Columbia University (E3B) ’12
Lea is interested in the intersection of ecology, evolutionary biology, and behavioral ecology. She is studying female dispersal and recruitment patterns in cooperatively breeding superb starlings. Her preliminary work suggests that females may recruit relatives into their new groups.
Columbia University (E3B) ’13
Maddy is interested in vocal communication and learning. She has previously worked in a number of hospitals, but this is her first time in in a biology lab. She is developing microsatellite markers in snapping shrimp to study kin structure in social groups.
Madeline Cohen
Kathleen Apakupakul
M.A. program Columbia University ’12
M.S. University of Michigan
B.S. John Hopkins University
Kathleen is interested in the relationship between diseases and social behavior. She has a B.S. in Environmental Science from John Hopkins University and an M.S. in Molecular Systematics and Evolution from the University of Michigan. For the past seven years, Kathleen has been a Research Associate and Lab Manager at the University of California, San Francisco studying the neural and genetic mechanisms of human disease. Previously, she worked in a lab at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science doing molecular work. She hopes to study MHC variation and mate choice in superb starlings.
Ph.D. candidate University of Washington
B.A. Cornell University
Rebecca participated in the Kenya Field Course in Winter 2009 and returned to Kenya in 2011. She helped set up a new study site at the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy to study how fire influences kin structure and social behavior in superb starlings.
Rebecca Harris
Rebecca Kelley
Ph.D. program Columbia University (started Fall 2011)
B.A. University of Miami, Ohio
Rebecca is interested in the evolution of social behavior, and how it is affected by genes, hormones, and the environment. She is especially intrigued by cooperative breeding behavior and the evolution of cooperation. As an undergraduate, she studied the genetic basis of social monogamy and parental care in the prairie vole. For her PhD, she hopes to combine field experiments with molecular studies to investigate cooperative breeding using the superb starlings as a model system.
Joseph Solomon
M.S. Hunter College
B.A. Oberlin College
Joe joined the lab after completing his MS at Hunter College in to learn molecular techniques. He is developing microsatellite markers in 3 species of sponge-dwelling snapping shrimp.
Gillian Carling
The Bronx High School of Science ’13
Gillian is a Sophomore at the Bronx High School of Science and working in the lab as part of their Biological and Physical Research Projects Mentorship Program. She is interested in animal behavior and social interactions. She is studying kin structure in sponge-dwelling snapping shrimp.
From left to right: Sara Keen, Joe Solomon, Kathleen Apakupakul, Melissa Mark, James Kealey, and Dustin Rubenstein. Although the undergraduate students were all taking final exams during the 2011 lab photo, they are depicted in the painting above.
