National Geographic Awards Research Grants to Herpetology Students

Jesse Grismer (mentor: Rafe Brown) has learned that he has been awarded a $20,000 grant from National Geographic’s Committee for Research and Exploration to study population genetics and taxonomic diversity of lizards in differing habitats across the Gobi Desert.  The upcoming Gobi expedition involves an integrative historical component which will include retracing travel routes of famed explorers Nikolai Przhevalsky and Ney Elias using original expedition accounts coupled with modern satellite based imagery and georeferencing tools.

In addition, Scott Travers (also in Rafe Brown’s group) has learned that his National Geographic Young Explorer’s Club proposal has been funded ($5,000) for work on adaptive radiation and community assembly of amphibians and reptiles in the Solomon Islands. This work will include blazing an elevational transect through uninhabited forests of Mt. Austen on Guadalcanal Island, the site of the infamous Guadalcanal Campaign battles between U.S. and Japanese troops in 1943.