LATEST NEWS

We are pleased to announce the recipient of the second annual SSE Lifetime Achievement Award, Dr. Richard E. Lenski. The Lifetime Achievement Award was created to recognize individuals who have made substantial contributions to the study of evolution, who have demonstrated outstanding mentorship of trainees, and/or who have provided noteworthy service to the evolution community. Dr. Lenski is the John Hannah Distinguished Professor of Microbial Ecology at Michigan State University (MSU). For more than 30 years, he has directed one of the most significant experiments in evolutionary biology, the E. coli Long Term Evolution Experiment (LTEE). He is one of the founding members of the BEACON Center for the Study of Evolution in Action at MSU, and today serves on its executive committee. Dr. Lenski has previously received a Guggenheim Fellowship and a MacArthur Fellowship, and has been elected to the American Academy of Microbiology, the European Molecular Biology Organization, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the National Academy of Sciences. In addition to his outstanding research contributions, he is known for being an exceptional mentor and role model. He also served the community as President of SSE in 2013. Congratulations, Dr. Lenski!

The SSE Dobzhansky Prize recognizes the accomplishments and future promise of an outstanding young evolutionary biologist. PhD recipients who were awarded their degree between January 1, 2017 and January 1, 2021 are eligible. The committee will consider circumstances that may extend eligibility (e.g., parental leave) and encourages nominations of biologists from historically under-represented groups. Potential applicants should contact committee chair Sarah Schaack at secretary@evolutionsociety.org with any questions about eligibility. Deadline extended to February 14.

 
Congratulations to our 13 recipients of the Graduate Research Excellence Grants (GREG) Rosemary Grant Advanced Awards! These awards are to assist students in the later stages of their Ph.D. programs by providing funding to enhance the scope of dissertation research, such as to conduct additional experiments or field work. Thank you to all our applicants. We received many excellent applications. Two awards were funded through donations to the George Gilchrist Student Support Fund. Thank you to all who donated!

Rosemary Grant Advanced Awards in memory of George Gilchrist:*

Jessica Aguilar, University of California Berkeley. Advisor: Noah Whiteman
Brandie Quarles, Duke University. Advisor: Kathleen Donohue
 
 Rosemary Grant Advanced Award Recipients:

Upama Aich, Australian National University. Advisor: Michael Jennions
Giorgia Auteri, University of Michigan. Advisor: L. Lacey Knowles
Henry Ertl, University of Michigan. Advisor: Patricia Wittkopp
Alice Gadau, The Rockefeller University. Advisor: Li Zhao
Benjamin Gerstner, University of New Mexico. Advisor: Ken Whitney
Yuki Haba, Princeton University. Advisor: Carolyn McBride
Michaël Nicolaï, Universiteit Gent. Advisor: Matthew Shawkey
Arjuna Rajakumar, McGill University. Advisor: Ehab Abouheif
Alexus Roberts, University of California, Davis. Advisor: Peter Wainwright
Pamela Santana, Universidade De Sao Paulo. Advisor: Paulo Guimarães Jr.
Xueling Yi, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Advisor: Emily Latch

*These awards were funded by donations to the George Gilchrist Student Support Fund.

We are pleased to announce a call for proposals for local and regional educational outreach activities to take place during 2021. It is our hope that these projects will lead to ongoing outreach collaboration in future years. Preference will be given to new collaborations, but extensions of previous projects that have evidence of success are allowed. Applicants must be members of SSE. We expect to award up to $1000 USD to 5 to 10 projects Proposals will be accepted until February 20, 2021.

The deadline for the ASN/SSE/SSB Inclusiveness, Diversity, Equity, and Access (IDEA) Award has been extended to February 1, 2021. This award recognizes a person or group at any career stage who has strengthened the ecology and evolutionary biology community by promoting inclusiveness and diversity in our fields. The award includes a $1000 USD honorarium. Learn more and submit your nomination here.

The Society for the Study of Evolution is pleased to announce the 2021 R. C. Lewontin Early Award competition. These grants are part of the Graduate Research Excellence Grants award program and are for students in the 1st or 2nd year of their PhD program. Awards will range from $1,500 to $2,500. Proposals will be due March 15. Learn more here.

Applications are now being accepted for the 2021 SSE Presidents’ Award for Outstanding Dissertation Paper in Evolution. To be eligible for consideration, a manuscript must be based on graduate work of the primary author. The manuscript must have been published in an issue of the journal Evolution in 2020 (Volume 74). 

Deadline: January 31, 2021

Learn more about how to apply here.

Congratulations to our new leaders: President-Elect Laura Galloway, Secretary Sarah Schaack, North American Vice President Leonie Moyle, Councilors Liz Alter and Maria Orive, and GSAC Chair-Elect Henry Arenas-Castro. The proposed amendment to expand Council passed; the SSE Council election will include three seats for Councilors starting with the 2021 election. Thank you to everyone who voted!

SSE is pleased to announce the new Membership Award, which offers free two-year SSE memberships to 100 individuals of any career stage who identify as racial or ethnic minorities, either in their country of origin or their country of residence. This initiative is part of SSE Council’s 2020 commitment to actions to increase inclusion of and support for members of historically excluded groups, particularly individuals who identify as Black, Indigenous, or people of color (BIPOC), in the field of evolutionary biology and through all of the society’s activities and programs. Learn more and apply here. 

Evolution 2021 will be VIRTUAL! The councils of SSB, ASN, and SSE have made the decision to cancel the in-person 2021 Evolution meeting that had been scheduled to be held in Albuquerque, NM. Our highest priorities are the health and well-being of our communities, as well as those of the workers who would help run our meeting and the communities we would be visiting. While we are hopeful that the current pandemic will abate by next summer, our decision had to be made now. 

The societies are discussing what form the virtual 2021 meeting will take. A survey to gauge interest and opinions can be found here: https://bit.ly/Evolution2021Survey. We encourage you to give us your opinion on the format of the virtual meeting, so that we can prepare the best meeting possible for our members. We especially hope those who face challenges attending in-person Evolution meetings will participate. We invite you to complete the survey before Wednesday, December 16th.

The Society for the Study of Evolution (SSE) Diversity Committee (DC) seeks to add two to three new members starting in 2021, at least one of which will be a graduate student. The DC works to create a professional society that is supportive of members from all backgrounds through several main actions: by broadening representation to the SSE Executive Council, by pursuing initiatives that support historically excluded groups, and by creating an inclusive, accessible environment at the Evolution conference. 

Continue reading for application instructions. Deadline: December 15, 2020

Nominations are now open for the 2021 Dobzhansky Prize, which recognizes the accomplishments and future promise of an outstanding young evolutionary biologist. To be eligible, the date you were or will be officially awarded your Ph.D. must be between January 1, 2017 and January 1, 2021. This award is not limited to any particular area of evolutionary biology. We value diversity, and are seeking a broad and diverse applicant pool from all axes and components of diversity in the evolutionary biology community. 

Deadline: January 31, 2021

Learn more and apply on the Dobzhansky Prize page.

We welcome your comments on a proposed amendment to the SSE Constitution. You will also be able to vote whether to approve this amendment during the upcoming SSE Council Election, beginning early November. The proposed amendment would increase the number of Councilors elected each year from two to three. Learn more and make comments on this page.

The American Society of Naturalists, the Society for the Study of Evolution, and the Society of Systematic Biologists announce the call for nominations for the 2nd annual ASN/SSE/SSB Inclusiveness, Diversity, Equity, and Access (IDEA) Award. The IDEA Award will be given to a person at any career stage who has strengthened the ecology and evolutionary biology community by promoting inclusiveness and diversity in our fields. The award can also be presented to a group. The recipient(s) will each receive a plaque at the annual meeting of ASN/SSB/SSE and a $1000 honorarium (shared among recipients if more than one).

Deadline: January 15, 2021

Click here to learn more and submit a nomination.

SSE leadership has been engaged in discussions focusing on increasing inclusion of and support for members of historically excluded groups, particularly individuals who identify as Black, Indigenous, or people of color (BIPOC), in the field of evolutionary biology and through all of the activities of the SSE. 

This fall, Council will conduct a thorough review of the discretionary budget¹, which includes everything except SSE’s operating and publishing costs, with the goal of allocating half of this spending to support efforts to address racial inequities and alleviate past injustices. The Diversity Committee has worked thoughtfully to develop proposals for action, including the following plans as first steps, which Council approved for the coming year:

• Assess existing SSE programs for impacts on diversity, equity, and inclusion


• Collect demographic data on SSE membership to assess representation of historically excluded groups and international members


• Offer 100 free SSE membership awards to BIPOC scientists at any career stage 


• Begin a series of roundtable discussions with evolutionary biologists from historically excluded groups to identify the ways in which scientific societies can best serve them


• Hire a Diversity Consultant to inform the further development of a long-term strategic plan utilizing input from the roundtable series 


• Amend criteria for grants and awards to specifically include aspects of scientific excellence that build community (e.g. mentoring, pedagogy, or DEI work) 


• SSE representation at the SACNAS and ABRCMS annual meetings to better reach members of groups historically excluded from evolutionary biology


• Increase representation on Council and editorial boards by calling for nominations annually, encouraging self-nominations, advertising regularly, and requesting diversity, inclusion, and equity impact statements from all nominees

In addition, SSE will be jointly writing, with our sister societies the American Society of Naturalists and the Society of Systematic Biologists, a proposal to the NSF to fund programs we are developing to support underrepresented undergraduate students in evolutionary biology. Stay tuned for more information about specific programs and initiatives and how you can participate. We welcome feedback and ideas via communications@evolutionsociety.org or diversity@evolutionsociety.org. Learn more about the mission and activities of the Diversity Committee here.

The SSE Code of Ethics Committee has been working hard since its inception in 2019 to develop a Code of Ethics, which Council recently voted in favor of adopting. The Code of Ethics is a set of ethical standards for SSE members that reflects the Society’s mission, values, and goals, as well as procedures for initiating and responding to complaints regarding violations of the Code of Ethics. In this work, it has drawn on codes of ethics of other scientific societies, as well as advisory documents from the Societies Consortium on Sexual Harassment In STEMM. A key next step this fall/winter will be an open comment period for member input. Once we have received and responded to member input, the Code of Ethics will be presented to the membership for approval. Thanks to the SSE Code of Ethics committee for their hard work: Amy Angert, Chris Caruso, Vince Formica, Isabel Gordo, and Mark Rausher.

This summer, the graduate student councils of SSE, the American Society of Naturalists (ASN), and the Society of Systematic Biologists (SSB) organized the Evolution Community Resources for Early Career Researchers (ECR^2) series of virtual events. Many events were recorded, and videos are now available on the ECR^2 YouTube channel. We especially recommend the outstanding plenary talk by Dr. Joseph Graves on African Americans in evolutionary science. 

All videos include edited captions available by selecting the CC button on each YouTube video. See the full list of events on the ECR^2 website, and watch all the videos on the ECR^2 YouTube channel.

In celebration of SSE’s 75th anniversary in 2021, Evolution will be accepting and publishing monthly Perspectives throughout the year to highlight the major scientific contributions published in Evolution since its inception and their continuing influence on the field. If you are interested in contributing a Perspective on an Evolution paper that has significantly shaped your work, please first express your interest by emailing Evolution EiC Tracey Chapman at Tracey.Chapman@uea.ac.uk. Prospective articles will then be submitted using the usual online submission process, with a lead in time of approximately two months. We look forward to reading the accepted pieces and celebrating SSE’s achievements over three-quarters of a century!

Save the date for the elections of SSE Council. The ballot and candidate statements will be posted in early November, and voting will close November 25. Voting will take place via the SSE website. Members will vote for the following positions: SSE President Elect, North American Vice President, Secretary, and two Councilors. 

Are you interested in serving on the SSE Council or the Evolution editorial board in the future? The SSE Nominating Committee seeks nominations (including self-nominations) on an ongoing basis. The next available SSE Council positions begin in 2022. Nominations submitted by March 1 will receive full consideration for that election cycle. The next slate of Evolution Associate Editor positions begin in 2021. Nominations submitted by July 1 will receive full consideration for that year's positions. For all Council and editorial board positions, SSE seeks a diversity of people and ideas, as well as participation by individuals committed to increasing diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility in science. Learn more and submit a nomination here.

The Evolution Highlights series showcases some of the interesting and varied papers published within the last few years in Evolution. The goal of these Evolution Highlights is to let our readers learn more about how the highlighted study came into existence and to invite the authors to share stories and tips from the perspective of a recently published author. We welcome nominations and self-nominations for this series.

Here we highlight "Ecological divergence plays an important role in strong but complex reproductive isolation in campions (Silene)." Highlight by Sophie Karrenberg.

The Evolution Highlights series showcases some of the interesting and varied papers published within the last few years in Evolution. The goal of these Evolution Highlights is to let our readers learn more about how the highlighted study came into existence and to invite the authors to share stories and tips from the perspective of a recently published author. We welcome nominations and self-nominations for this series.

Here we highlight "In love and war: The morphometric and phylogenetic basis of ornamentation, and the evolution of male display behavior, in the livebearer genus Poecilia." Highlight by Daniel Goldberg.

In the New Faculty Profiles, we invite highlighted faculty to discuss their research, describe how SSE has impacted their career, and share any tips or stories they may have for other researchers. This month we highlight Dr. Rebecca Tarvin.

In the New Faculty Profiles, we invite highlighted faculty to discuss their research, describe how SSE has impacted their career, and share any tips or stories they may have for other researchers. This month we highlight Dr. Jesse Weber.

As previously announced, the award for an exceptional Ph.D. dissertation paper published in the journal Evolution, formerly called the R. A. Fisher Prize, has been renamed. A statement about the history of the name and the reason for its change can now be found on the award webpage. SSE Council continues to work on broader issues concerning diversity and representation in our membership, our grant and prize awardees, and leadership. Learn more on the page for our Diversity Committee, which guides these initiatives.

Applications are now open for the 2020 Graduate Research Excellence Grants - Rosemary Grant Advanced Awards. These awards are to assist students in the later stages of their Ph.D. programs. Awards will range from US$2,000 - $3,500 and approximately ten awards will be made. Funds can be used to enhance the scope of dissertation research, such as to conduct additional experiments or field work. Proposals are due September 15. Learn more here.