Aug 09, 2024

Ecology Student Wins Award from Phycological Society of America

Caleb Butler, an Ecology graduate student working in Todd LaJeunesse's lab, won an award for their presentation at a Seattle-based meeting of the Phycological Society of America.

Caleb Butler, a graduate student in the Huck’s Ecology program, was recognized earlier this month with the Harold C. Bold Award from the Phycological Society of America (PSA). The PSA was founded in 1946 to promote research and teaching in the field of phycology, the study of algae. It publishes the semi-monthly Journal of Phycology and the Phycological Newsletter.

Butler, who works in the lab of Professor of Biology Todd LaJeunesse, said they were “honored and humbled” to win the award for their presentation on symbiotic relationships between single-celled algae and coral reefs.

“Coral bleaching is defined by the loss of these symbionts, so many people know more about these organisms than they would think,” Butler said. “Interestingly, soft corals are doing well compared to hard corals globally, but we know little to nothing about their symbionts compared to hard corals. For this talk, I presented the very first comprehensive survey of soft coral symbionts across the Indo-Pacific Ocean and discovered broad, but strict, levels of coral-symbiont specificity we don't see in hard corals.”

The Bold Award, which is judged during a special judged session of the Society’s annual meeting, is the highest honor the Society gives to graduate students. LaJeunesse, Butler’s adviser, has a long history with the PSA and the Bold Award. While volunteering at the 1996 meeting as a graduate student, he was impressed by the presentations and has since encouraged students in his lab to attend PSA meetings and compete for the award. A previous graduate student in his lab, Hannah Reich, won in 2019 and is now an Assistant Professor at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry.

“I remember thinking how fantastic the presentations were and the quality of the science, and how I admired and was inspired with their accomplishment,” said LaJeunesse. “Because of my good experiences with smaller scientific societies like the Phycological Society of America and the fact that we work on symbiotic dinoflagellates (reef corals and other symbiotic animals are just the backdrop of our research), I recommended my students to attend these smaller, friendlier meetings.”