Lauren C. Ponisio
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Our lab's research focuses on how species interactions maintain species diversity and how we can harness these processes to manage and restore diversity in human-modified habitats. Our lab combining modeling, synthesis and field-based work, and adhere to the principles of reproducible, open science.
Lauren earned a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and an M.S. and B.S. from Stanford University. Her research has examined ways to persuade California almond growers to adopt more bee-friendly agricultural practices, discovered how native bee species may be best equipped to survive intensive agricultural practices, and analyzed how forest fires can help maintain pollinator biodiversity. She is currently leading a study that could change how forestlands in the Pacific Northwest are managed to benefit wild bees. In addition to her research in the biological sciences, her mission is to promote human diversity in the sciences. |
Rebecca Hayes |
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PhD
Rebecca is an ecological data scientist interested in how biotic and abiotic factors shape the biogeography of bee associates. Her dissertation explores how strong and weak microbial associates of bees differ in their biogeographical diversity patterns. She uses field and lab methods to explore the microbiome and pollen composition and employs analytical methods including network turnover, multivariate compositional analysis, Bayesian structural equation modeling, and machine learning. She is also the lead workshop developer and facilitator for the Trans and Gender Non-conforming Field Alliance, offering a scenario-based field safety training to address the specific needs of LGBTQ+ researchers conducting field work. She successfully defended her dissertation in 2026 and is currently on the job market. |
Nicole Martinez |
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PhD student
Nicole's general interest is in ecological interactions, entomology, and botany. She is from Puerto Rico where she studied the effects and changes in community dynamics on plant-pollinator interaction networks caused by hurricanes. Nicole is mainly interested in plant-pollinator interactions and how those interactions can be affected by different variables such as invasive species, natural disasters, and anthropogenic disturbances. She is also interested in how pollinators as drivers of natural selection can influence breeding systems in plants. |
Rose McDonald |
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PhD student
Rose joined Dr. Ponisio’s lab in Fall 2022 after working as a research technician at the Montana State University where she studied honey host-pathogen interactions. She previously worked as a field technician at the University Wisconsin Madison, analyzing the impact of landscape composition on wild bee populations. She received her bachelor’s degrees of biology and history from UMass Amherst in 2021. For her Ph.D., Rose is reconstructing wild pollinator habitats within managed forests and is also interested in studying the underlying drivers of pathogen spread in wild bee communities. |
Alejandro Santillana |
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PhD student
Alejandro's research focuses on how environmental variation shapes plant-pollinator interactions across space and time. Using field-based sampling and network approaches, he investigates the relative roles of species turnover and interaction rewiring in driving network change, with the goal of understanding how mutualistic systems respond to environmental change. Alejandro's work encompasses plant-pollinator communities from high-elevation meadows in the southwestern U.S. (Sky Islands) and resurveyed sites in California, where communities are being sampled more than 50 years after the original surveys. |
Megan Fenner
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Master's Student
Megan gained interest in pollinators as an undergraduate at Colorado State University where she used radio telemetry to track bumble bee movement. In 2025, Megan joined Dr. Lauren Ponisio's lab, where she continues to pursue her interest in pollinator behavioral complexity through studying how wildfires shape plant-pollinator interaction network dynamics. She is interested in understanding how wildfires shape pollinator trait diversity as well as functional diversity, and hopes to generate better understanding towards fire's long-term impacts on pollinator populations. Megan conducts research at H. J. Andrew's Experimental Forest, where she samples pollinators at LTER meadow complexes. |
Lauren Berger
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Master's Student
Lauren Berger is a graduate researcher in the Ponisio lab, where she studies plant communities in post-fire landscapes of the West Cascades. Before joining the lab, she spent over two years as a Plant Materials Technician at the Institute for Applied Ecology, contributing to large-scale seed collection efforts across Oregon and deepening her focus on restoration and conservation ecology. She received her bachelor's degree in Literature from UC Santa Cruz in 2019. Her research focuses on the Holiday Farm Fire, where she investigates how wildfires in managed forests shape plant community diversity and functional trait composition. |
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Lab alumni |
