Elizabeth Bastiaans - Associate Professor of Biology
I’m a behavioral ecologist interested in sexual selection, mating systems, and life history evolution. I’ve primarily worked with amphibians and reptiles, but I’m always happy to learn about a new system! Graduate students in my lab have pursued projects on wood turtles, red-backed salamanders, and even (through a collaboration with SUNY Cobleskill) burying beetles.
My doctoral dissertation focused on polymorphic sexual coloration and alternative mating tactics in the mesquite lizard, Sceloporus grammicus, which lives in montane habitats in Mexico. Since finishing my PhD in 2013, I’ve branched out to work on many other projects and systems. I also continue collaborating with several amazing Mexican herpetologists working on Sceloporus grammicus and its close relatives. ¡Hablo español con fluidez, y siempre estoy dispuesta a empezar nuevas colaboraciones en Latinoamérica!
If you’re interested in starting a collaboration or joining the lab as an undergraduate researcher or master’s student, please get in touch at elizabeth.bastiaans@oneonta.edu.
Current Graduate Students
Alex Byrne - M.S. Biology Student
A graduate in biology from Paul Smith’s College in 2023, Alex joined SUNY Oneonta as a master’s student in Spring 2024. Even prior to finishing his bachelor’s degree, however, Alex had assisted on a wide range of projects, including studies of the life history of mink frogs and red backed salamanders, mesocosm studies on larval amphibian predator-prey dynamics, applying decision analysis to water quality monitoring programs and providing numerous technical reports to the NYC parks department on an urban assemblage of ants, beetles, benthic macroinvertebrates, and fungi. Alex is currently using a combination of mesocosm experiment, manipulation of constructed vernal pools and AI visual tracking software to better understand A) the effects of asynchronous breeding patterns in wood frogs, B) wood frog tadpole social behavior, and C) American toad schooling behavior.
Victoria Prouty - M.S. Biology Student
Victoria completed her Bachelor’s Degree at Colgate University with a major in environmental biology and a minor in geography and arrived at SUNY Oneonta in Fall 2023. She conducted her undergraduate thesis research on the effectiveness of liming as a mitigative strategy for acidic deposition in Adirondack forests. Using aboveground net primary productivity as an indicator of tree growth, her study focused on the differential effects of liming and soil acidity on various tree species and size classes. Victoria’s interests in conservation biology and species-specific responses to anthropogenic climate change have led her to pursue her Master’s in Biology at Oneonta, where she will conduct a comparative analysis of historical and modern wood turtles to uncover factors contributing to population declines and to determine possible conservation strategies. Victoria will also be working closely with Oneonta’s vertebrate museum collections.
Rachael Wolf - M.S. Biology Student
Rachael Wolf earned a B.S. in Bioinformatics at Iowa State University in 2018, after which she worked for two different agricultural genetics labs. She came to SUNY Oneonta in Fall 2022 as a research volunteer and then officially joined the lab as a graduate student in Spring 2023. Rachael’s thesis work focuses on tracking red-backed salamanders over time, using SUNY Oneonta’s SPARCnet research plots. She will use next-generation population genetics methods to study how salamanders’ relatedness to their neighbors affects their territory use and movement over time. She is also documenting biofluorescence in red-backed salamanders and studying how it changes over time in individual, marked animals.
Graduate Alumni
John Pipino
Upon completion of the Environmental Management bachelor’s program at SUNY Cobleskill, John began his master’s degree in biology at SUNY Oneonta in the Summer of 2021. His interest in invertebrate ecology and conservation biology has led him to the current American burying beetle reintroduction effort in New York State. John’s thesis research focused on the factors impacting post-release viability of American burying beetle, which include overwintering survival and competition for reproductive resources. He graduated in May 2024 and is currently a Research Scientist at SUNY Cobleskill, continuing to work towards the reintroduction of the American burying beetle to New York.
Bethany Ozolins
Bethany joined the lab in Fall 2020 and graduated with her M.S. in Biology in Spring 2023. Her thesis work encompassed a variety of topics, all in red-backed salamanders. Bethany worked on a population genetics study with nine salamander populations in Schoharie County, NY, where there is a seemingly novel population of ~20% expressing the lead back color morph. She also completed a study investigating the energy demands of tail regeneration post-autonomy in red-backed salamanders. Finally, Bethany used SUNY Oneonta’s SPARCnet plots to study how novice (and experienced) researchers make errors when reading salamander marks, with the goal of making recommendations to reduce those errors. Currently, Bethany is coordinating the SPARCnet RaMP (Research and Mentoring for Postbaccalaureates) program, an NSF-funded program that awards recent college graduates paid, year-long research fellowships to work with principal investigators who are part of the SPARCnet collaboration.
Richard Jones
Richard started his master’s in Fall 2021 and graduated in Spring 2023. He came to Oneonta from just outside of Fayetteville, North Carolina. During his undergrad at St. Andrews University, he studied psychology as well as a variety of other sciences through the pre-med program. Following that, he spent a few years teaching science for both middle and high school, as well as coaching soccer. At Oneonta, Richard studied how red-backed salamanders respond behaviorally to predator attacks and how they acclimate to changing temperatures during their spring and fall active seasons. He also used the SPARCnet plots to study what factors predict whether a salamander will or won’t move between cover objects. After completing his M.S. in Biology, Richard returned to teaching high school as of the Fall 2023 semester.