I am broadly interested in how resources flow through decomposer food webs, from accumulating leaf litter, to microbes (bacteria and fungi), microbivores (collembola and mites), and on to their predators.

Specifically, I study the evolution, ecology, and natural history of ants. Ants are important consumers in many ecosystems, and rank among the most widely studied insects. However, foraging ants belong to colonies that process resources hidden in nests. Traits of whole colonies have thus been described for relatively few of the 12,000 known ant species. Furthermore, ant colonies have life histories—they decide when to reproduce, and how much of a limited resource pool to allocate to reproduction.

My dissertation research combines field experiments in a Panamanian rainforest with respirometry studies of Oklahoma grassland ants.