Evolutionary biologist, author and science educator Sean Carroll came to visit Emory this week. Several undergraduates and grad students, including our own Erica Harris, had the opportunity to have lunch with him. Thanks for a great visit!

Work on aphid-symbiont-ladybird beetle interactions by former postdoc Jen Kovacs (now at Spelman College) and former undergrad Kelly Costopoulos (now attending medical school) was featured in Entomology Today.

Congratulations to Greg Fricker for receiving highest honors for his undergraduate honors thesis. The many late nights dissecting bugs, which still continue, have paid off.

Justine Garcia defended her Ph.D. thesis today. She gave an excellent talk and then ate pizza and cake. Overall, a pretty good day. Thanks to her family for coming to celebrate.

What she once may have seen as a never ending story is coming to an end. Congratulations!

The Gerardo lab participated in the second annual Atlanta Science Festival this weekend. At the expo, members of the lab cultured 400 plates of Luria Broth agar with members of the Atlanta community. Participants swabbed hands, ear, noses, cell phones and the bottoms of their shoes. Check out mycrobes.org to see what grows.

Graduate student Justine Garcia participated in the University of Michigan’s Early Career Scientists Symposium last weekend. The invitation to speak was quite an honor. Meghan Duffy (U. Mich) sent this picture from the audience.