Shaela Patel, a SOLS sophomore studying conservation biology with a minor in sustainability and certificates in cross-sector leadership and environmental education, already has gained invaluable experience interning at SolarSPELL and her passion for making a tangible impact through teaching and conservation initiatives.

Patel's introduction to SolarSPELL came through a recommendation from Abby Johnson, who recognized Patel's dedication to sustainability and environmental education. SolarSPELL is a unique initiative that provides digital libraries powered by solar energy, designed to serve communities in areas with limited internet access. Her role as an intern focused on curating educational content for these libraries, specifically targeting sustainable agriculture and environmental practices.

"It was one of the best internship experiences I could’ve had," she said with enthusiasm, recalling her time at SolarSPELL. Her tasks ranged from creating accessible educational resources about coffee production in Rwanda to developing infographics that translated complex scientific articles into digestible content for rural communities. These efforts were aimed at helping local farmers adopt sustainable practices through easily understandable materials.

Following the spring semester, Patel continued her work with SolarSPELL over the summer, this time focusing on their Wikipedia for Schools project. This initiative aimed to curate content for students in South Africa and Lesotho, particularly those in elementary and middle school. Her goal was to find articles that were not only informative but also engaging and relevant to the students’ everyday lives.

"I found a lot of stuff on environmental education, personal sustainability and even ecotourism," Shaela noted, highlighting her commitment to making learning both fun and educational. Her love for animals also led her to add numerous entries on native South African species, allowing students to explore and learn about the wildlife in their own backyard.

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A passion for teaching and conservation

Patel’s passion for environmental education didn’t start at SolarSPELL. Her journey began years earlier as a volunteer at the Reid Park Zoo in Tucson, Arizona, where she eventually worked as a summer camp educator. Teaching kids about animals, sustainability and conservation efforts sparked a realization that this was more than just a job—it was her calling.

Reflecting on her senior year of high school and her volunteer experiences, Patel shared, "The education I received made me realize that I could do something to address environmental problems, and that’s what inspired me to pursue this field." This hands-on approach to education, first shown to her by her high school marine biology and environmental science teacher, Mr. Fetkenhour, aims to empower young minds to take actionable steps towards a more sustainable future.

For Patel, the most rewarding aspect of her work is seeing the direct impact her educational efforts have on the kids she teaches. Whether it’s through her involvement in SolarSPELL or her work at the Zoo, her goal remains the same: to inspire the next generation to care about the environment and to equip them with the tools they need to make a difference.

"Action comes directly from education," she emphasized. "You can't do anything to help the planet until you learn about it first." This belief drives her to continue her efforts in both environmental education and conservation, hoping to instill the same passion in others that was once sparked in her.

One of the unique aspects of SolarSPELL is its dedication to feedback and improvement. Shaela shared how the organization continually collects data from the communities they serve to refine their educational materials and tools. This loop of continuous learning and adaptation ensures that the resources they provide are both relevant and effective.

"The feedback we get is invaluable," Patel said. "It helps us understand what the communities need and how we can improve their educational experience." This approach not only enhances the learning process but also strengthens the bond between SolarSPELL and the communities it serves.

In the future, Patel hopes to work in veterinary science, yet she remains deeply committed to environmental education. "I not only want to go out and help animals, but I also want to teach other people how to help them too," she said. Shaela’s experience at SolarSPELL has broadened her perspective, showing her that her impact can extend beyond direct conservation to include educating others to continue the work.

For young people looking to make a difference, Patel's advice is simple: "Get educated and then take action." She believes that understanding the issues is the first step toward making meaningful changes, whether it’s through small personal actions or larger community initiatives. As she continues her studies and expands her impact in environmental conservation, she remains focused on her ultimate goal: to inspire a new generation of environmental stewards who will carry the torch of sustainability forward.

When most high school students consider their futures, the path to college often seems a straightforward journey. However, for those like Sierra Planck, who spent a significant portion of their youth in the foster care system, the road to higher education can be filled with uncertainty and unique challenges. Through the Arizona foster care system and help from Arizona State University, Planck is pursuing her passion for wildlife and conservation.

Having been in foster care for a long period of her youth, financial concerns and the complexities of navigating higher education as a foster youth were daunting. "I wasn't even sure that I would be able to attend university at that point in my life," Planck says. "I thought maybe I could afford going to community college and then transfer to ASU afterward." 

Arizona's Department of Child Safety (DCS) collaborates with various organizations to provide educational assistance. This support extended beyond covering exam fees and help with college expenses, it also covered prom and extracurricular costs in high school. Contrary to common misconceptions, foster youth do not automatically receive free tuition at state schools; eligibility and application for scholarships are necessary steps. Among the notable scholarships Planck received were the Obama Scholarship and the Nina Scholars Legacy Program, founded by conservationist Nina Mason Pulliam to aid disadvantaged youth and adults.

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Upon turning 18, foster youth in Arizona can choose to exit the system or stay voluntarily until 21, receiving a gradually decreasing living stipend. For Planck, remaining in the system was a strategic choice, allowing her to focus on her education and ambitions. Determined to excel, she pursued a scholastic diploma, which included taking specialized classes, participating in a veterinary assistant program near ASU Polytech. Despite an initial interest in veterinary medicine, she soon realized her true calling lay elsewhere.

"I used the Kuder Career Navigator to explore various career options," she explains. "Eventually, I found my passion in conservation biology and ecology." This decision was bolstered by the practical experiences they sought out, including interviewing professionals in wildlife organizations and volunteering at a local animal shelter and the Phoenix Zoo.

Thriving at ASU: Clubs, research and community

Planck received her degree from the School of Life Sciences in conservation biology and ecology with a minor in sustainability.

Her time at ASU was marked by active involvement in various clubs and organizations. She was a member of the ASU Gardening Club, the Ocean Conservation Club, and the Nature at ASU Club, among others. These extracurricular activities provided a sense of community and opportunities to connect with like-minded peers and professionals.

In her freshman year, she participated in undergraduate research with Corina Logan, studying the behavior of the great-tailed grackle and how it adapts to urban environments. This experience, alongside the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, further solidified Planck’s commitment to fieldwork over laboratory settings.

"I started joining clubs relevant to my interests and hassling my advisors every semester to ensure I could complete my major, minor, and two certificates within four years," she recalls. The online format of many classes during the pandemic allowed them to manage an intense course load, sometimes taking up to 24 credit hours per semester.

"Flexibility has been key," she reflects. "I never wanted to have a rigid game plan because that can set you up for failure. By pursuing multiple qualifications and gaining hands-on experience, I've opened more doors for my future."

Making a difference through volunteer work

Volunteer work has played a crucial role in shaping Planck’s career trajectory. One notable project was the black-footed ferret spotlighting program with Arizona Game and Fish, which was introduced to her by the Central Arizona Chapter for the Society of Conservation Biology, where she participated in overnight shifts to locate and vaccinate these endangered animals. This experience led to a fortuitous introduction to Emily Thomas, president of the Maricopa Audubon Society. Thomas recognized Planck’s potential and recommended them for a summer internship with the Sonoran Audubon Society, focusing on the endangered yellow-billed cuckoo.

"The internship was from June to September, tracking population data for the yellow-billed cuckoo," she explains. "Upon completion this summer, I became certified to work with this endangered species." This certification, combined with her extensive volunteer work and an internship that spanned two summers paved the way for further opportunities.

Today, Planck is a board member for the Maricopa Audubon Society, holding the position of Publicity Coordinator. In this role, she manages the organization's Facebook page and participates in various outreach events, advocating for wildlife conservation and engaging the community.

Her dedication extends beyond personal achievements. She actively mentors other students, sharing their wealth of knowledge and resources. "I want to help pave the way and make the process less intimidating for others," she emphasizes. Helping others is another passion of hers, one that she gets to pursue alongside her love for conservation. Her efforts include creating a comprehensive resource guide for students interested in conservation biology, encompassing volunteer opportunities, resume-building tips and advice for navigating the field.

In July, SOLS professors Ted Pavlic and Jessie Ebie brought two PhD students and one undergraduate student with them on a field work trip to Townsville, Queensland, Australia. While on the trip, they observed and collected weaver ants to bring back to their labs in Tempe.

The weaver ant colonies that were collected and brought back to their labs in Tempe will be used to further their research in cooperative behavior and communication & reproductive regulation within the colonies. 

Cooperative behavior concepts can be used in engineering

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Pavlic, whose research focuses on the cooperative behavior of ants, was particularly intrigued by how weaver ants manage to transport large objects in teams, despite the challenges posed by their spatially separated sub-nests. His work investigates the decision-making processes involved when ants from different subunits come together to move food items. This cooperative transport not only involves horizontal movement but also the vertical challenge of carrying objects up trees. Pavlic, who is jointly appointed in ASU’s School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence, does research that extends beyond biological curiosity, seeking to apply these natural mechanisms to engineering and robotics.

“The weaver ants’ ability to carry objects up trees and resolve decision points in decentralized ways offers insights into broader natural problem-solving mechanisms,” Pavlic explained. His work aims to understand how these trade-offs in nature can inform the design of more effective robotic systems.

Anoushka Dasgupta, a PhD student in Pavlic’s lab studying animal behavior and fascinated by cooperative transport, was captivated by the weaver ants’ ability to coordinate their efforts in both horizontal and vertical movements. Her research focuses on how these ants make decision-making regarding food transport and how they interact with it.

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“An incredible amount of strength is required for these tiny ants to carry these things that are huge compared to them, like crickets and mealworms” Dasgupta noted. The trip allowed her to see firsthand the contrasts between the desert ants of Arizona and the Australian weaver ants, deepening her understanding of how these species manage cooperative transport under different environmental conditions.

“I was able to observe the ants in their natural setting, which was incredibly beneficial for understanding their behavior in the wild,” she explained. “It’s one thing to study them in the lab, but seeing them in action outdoors provided a whole new perspective.”

Decoding communication and reproductive regulation

Ebie's research centers on the communication and reproductive regulation within weaver ant colonies. These colonies, which can span up to a dozen trees, rely on complex chemical signals to coordinate their activities. Her work seeks to identify the compounds responsible for signaling the presence of the queen, who resides at a central location within this sprawling network of nests.

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“Our goal is to pinpoint the exact chemical signals used by the queen to regulate worker reproduction,” Ebie says. This research not only enhances our understanding of ant behavior but also has practical applications, such as developing synthetic attractants to temporarily lure ants away from fruit trees during picking season and then back into the trees to ward off pests during growing season, benefiting local farmers.

Ariel Aslan, an undergraduate student double majoring in ecology and conservation biology and data science, was fascinated by the reproductive communication within weaver ant colonies. Her observations highlighted the unique ways ants build their nests using silk produced by their larvae and their aggressive territorial behaviors.

“I was amazed by how the ants use their larvae as natural glue guns to weave nests and how they defend their territory with such intensity,” Aslan remarks. Her experiences in the field, including the challenges of working closely with these ants, provided a deep appreciation for the complexities of their social structure.

Aslan found the process of collecting queen nests both exhilarating. “Seeing the ants react to the queen pod was like a treasure hunt. For me, seeing this gave me a rush of excitement because I knew I was about to find the queen. ”

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Beth Ponn, a PhD candidate in the Animal Behavior program in the Ebie and Liebig labs, focuses on how the queen’s signal is transmitted across vast areas of the colony. Her research aims to identify the specific signals that communicate the queen’s presence and maintain colony cohesion.

“The concept of ants acting as a single organism is intriguing,” Ponn says. “Studying how they manage to coordinate and maintain their collective functioning over large distances offers insights into their social dynamics.”

Ponn’s research will also emphasize the importance of understanding how these signals are communicated and maintained across the colony. 

An immersive experience

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Reflecting on the trip, Pavlic emphasized the importance of fieldwork in education. “When a student goes out and is in the field and starts seeing the ants do things on their own that they didn’t make them do and start asking their own questions, you can see them get a new grounding in why it’s significant,” he says, and Ebie agrees, “It allows students to put those questions in context. They can see what you’ve been explaining and actually see and discover those nuances. It’s an opportunity to see the things we’re talking about in the classroom in real life and these interactions between different organisms. It’s invaluable in education.”

For Aslan, she says that working alongside other academics has shown her what that path can look like when she graduates. “I’m only a sophomore right now, but I think I would like to get my PhD. That’s been my idea for a long time because I want to develop my own questions, continue to learn and make contributions to the scientific field. As a student, this trip was a dream.”

Note: This story is part of an ongoing series profiling graduate students in the School of Life Sciences. See April's featured students here. 

Gissel Marquez Alcaraz – Evolutionary Biology 

What do cancer, cacti, and kombucha have in common?  

For Gissel Marquez Alcaraz, a third year PhD candidate in the Evolutionary Biology program, they’re all model systems for studying evolution. 

Marquez Alcaraz has been interested in studying cancer since she was an undergraduate. She read Athena Aktipis, a psychologist at ASU, speaking about adaptive therapy during an interview. Rather than attempting to eradicate cancer cells, adaptive therapy seeks to control tumors to keep them from spreading, which could prolong the lives of people who have cancer.  

“It was this idea of possibly controlling cancer and allowing people to live with it. That’s what initially led me to reach out to [Aktipis],” Marquez Alcaraz explains. “And [Aktipis] told me, ‘I actually don't have a cancer lab right now. But I have space in my kombucha lab. If you do the kombucha work now, maybe you can do the cancer work later.’” 

So, throughout her bachelor’s, Marquez Alcaraz worked for and eventually ran the kombucha project in the Cooperation lab, studying how yeast and bacteria in kombucha cooperate and compete, as well as how the system evolves in response to disturbances. When she started her PhD, she finally got the chance to start researching cancer, too. 

After joining the Cancer and Evolution lab, Marquez Alcaraz followed her curiosities. She began investigating cancer in saguaro cacti, which, when infected, start branching out in alien-looking crests and folds. 

“I see (cancer in cacti) as more of a metaphor. If I can tell people a cactus has cancer, and it lived for 200 years, and it was probably one of the most iconic things in the hiking trail for years and years, maybe people can be inspired by that.” 

But Marquez Alcaraz mostly focuses on developing treatments for humans. She both looks at whether certain types of probiotics can help improve cancer treatment outcomes and tests adaptive therapy techniques in mice models, all with the hope of improving the lives of people who have cancer. She also co-directs the ACE scholars' program, which employs over 60 undergraduate researchers who are all studying cancer, too. 

“Cancer treatment is so harsh. I see it, I work with it, and I hate it. If we can provide people with something less strenuous on the body, like a probiotic, and that can help their cancer treatment, that’s awesome. And with adaptive therapy, prolonging people’s lives would be an incredible achievement. I want to get cancer to a point where people can live with it rather than having it be a death sentence at its later stages.” 

Brit Burgard – Plant Biology and Conservation 

Anyone who lives in the western US has probably heard of wildfires near where they live, if they haven’t encountered them directly. One hit particularly close to home for Brit Burgard, a second-year master’s student in the Plant Biology and Conservation program. In 2021, she was living in Superior, Arizona, when the Telegraph Fire hit, which burned over 180,000 acres –– about the area of Austin, Texas.  

Burgard was working at the Boyce Thompson Arboretum then and was part of the effort to help protect the garden against the fire. Afterwards, when she began her master’s at ASU, she wondered what the wildfire’s effects on the desert were. 

“Wildfire is increasing in the Sonoran Desert as a result of climate change and invasive species,” Burgard explains. “That increase was something I wanted to look at because the Sonoran Desert isn't considered fire adapted. But we don't necessarily know a lot about how fire affects individual species, and we can clearly see that some of the larger sort of keystone species are affected negatively.” 

To begin understanding how the Sonoran Desert reacts to wildfire, Burgard conducted a flora, or catalog of species, along the perimeter of the area burned by the Telegraph fire within the desert. So far, she’s found that some species, like brittlebush and globe mallow, can return well after a fire, as fire releases some nutrients into the soil. But other species, like saguaro, might not be able to bounce back so easily. 

With that in mind, Burgard has also spent much of her master’s conducting research att he Boyce Thompson Arboretum on saguaro restoration. She monitors how young saguaros grow when planted at different ages and with differing access to water to inform researchers who will try to replant saguaros in the future.  

“It was very fun to do that. When I worked at BTA, I actually seeded the saguaro (that I used for the project. So it was great to come back to them.” 

That work, which she does outside of her master’s thesis, has largely been funded by the Benson award, which is awarded to graduate students who want to do conservation research at the arboretum. Burgard has won the award twice.  

“I’m extremely honored to have received that award. It was really awesome because it allowed me to focus on my work.” 

By studying both the after effects of wildfire and looking into strategies to help the desert rebound, Burgard’s work should help other researchers better protect the Arizona wilderness in the face a of a changing climate.