Recent happenings in and around the lab...
20221026 - Beginning on November 7 and running through the spring 2023 semester, we are holding a journal club type series of discussions focused on environmental DNA (eDNA) research. The meetings will take place on Mondays every two weeks from 2:30 pm Alaska time in person (UA Museum conference room) and on Zoom. The discussions are open to anyone with an interest in eDNA.
20221026 - Maggie Harings, Kristen Reece, and Sydney Almgren were featured in an article on genomics research at UAF for Aurora magazine. Check it out here!
20221025 - Sydney Almgren's proposal to the EPSCoR seed grant program was awarded!! She will be using low coverage whole genome sequencing to examine the genetic basis of sex determination in Bering Sea populations of Pacific herring (Clupea pallasii). Be on the look out for Sydney's project website going live soon....
20220919 - In collaboration with the Glass lab group, we are hosting a monthly open meeting to discuss emerging topics in eDNA techniques and developments in the world of eDNA in Alaska. The meeting is concurrently hosted on Zoom and open to anyone who wants to participate.
20220915 - A website for our ongoing effort to test and validate eDNA tools in the service of spawning salmon abundance estimation is now live! We will us that site to share developments and team activities. The website design and creation is a joint effort of Maggie Harings and Kristen Reece.
20220908 - Anna Rix successfully defended her dissertation today. A few more tweaks on the manuscript and she will be off to postdoc life!
20220902 - We are gearing up for another academic year! We will be holding regular group meetings in conjunction with Dr. Jessica Glass team. We are also welcoming new graduate and undergraduate students as they begin research on fish population genetics and environmental DNA applications.
20220815 - Brand new Fisheries graduate student, Sydney Almgren joined the group to work on population genetics of Pacific Herring from the Bering Sea!
20220520 - Maggie Harings and Kristen Reece will be at UAF's Arctic Research Day demonstrating the principles of environmental DNA and their application in our work to deploy eDNA techniques in the estimation of salmon spawning run abundance.
20220414 - Laura Timm received a travel award from the Alaska EPSCoR program to attend the upcoming Workshop on Molecular Evolution in Woods Hole, MA.
20220411 - Habiba and Daphne are presenting posters on their ongoing research at the Midnight Sun Science Symposium
20220315 - Anna Rix was awarded a Degree Completion award from the UAF's Graduate School to support the finishing effort to write and defend her dissertation research!!
20220310 - Maggie Harings won Best Lightning Talk at the 2022 annual meeting of Alaska Chapter of American Fisheries Society for her presentation on "Evaluating Environmental DNA as a Complementary Tool for Estimating Salmon Abundance in the Yukon River Basin"
20220228 - The 2022 annual meeting of Alaska Chapter of American Fisheries Society takes place next week (February 28 through March 4) virtually. Members of the lab are giving short and long format presentations. If you are at the meeting check them out!
Maggie Harings
"Evaluating Environmental DNA as a Complementary Tool for Estimating Salmon Abundance in the Yukon River Basin" (March 3, 11:45 am)
Justin Hill
"Predation impacts of common merganser on Chinook salmon revealed using genetic analysis of scat" (March 1st, 2 pm)
Brandi Kamermans
"Understanding Spirinchus thaleichthys: local researchers searching for a declining population of a species valued by the Lhaq’temish in Bellingham Bay and the Nooksack River, WA" (March 3, 2022, 2:35 pm)
Anna Rix
"Population structure of lake trout from three river drainages in interior and southcentral Alaska" (March 3, 2 pm)
"A brief overview of a Broad Whitefish Coregonus nasus transcriptome" (March 3, 4:50 pm)
Laura Timm
"Seascape genomics in North Pacific forage fishes: opportunities and challenges" (March 3, 4:45pm)
"Whole genome resequencing confirms and characterizes genetic population structure in the abundant rockfish species, Pacific ocean perch (Sebastes alutus)" (Wed March 3, 1:45pm)
20220225 - Last fall, a class from Hutchison High got to play with DNA and gel electrophoresis. Teacher and former lab member, Robert Marcotte, led the activity and we were happy to lend a few pieces of equipment to help make it happen.
20220214 - Maggie Harings and Kristen Reece were awarded a 2022 Western Division AFS Small Project Grant to extend their ongoing collaboration testing the performance of eDNA in quantitative estimation of spawning salmon run abundance!!
20220201- We were awarded a research grant from the Pollock Conservation Cooperative Research Center (PCCRC) to conduct a population genetic analysis of Pacific herring aggregations in the Bering Sea. This effort will also support training for a graduate student in fisheries genetics.
20220107 - Kristen Reece received an undergraduate research award from the UAF's BLaST program to work with Maggie and the lab on our eDNA / salmon abundance study
20220102 - Happy 2022! We contributed a story for the News-Miner (our local newspaper) based on Anna's work on lake trout!
20211201 - Our 'Fish & Genes' journal club for Spring 2022 will meet on every Friday at 10 am (Alaska time). We'll start weekly meetings on January 14. The planned reading list will be posted on the journal club page.
20211122- Maggie, Justin and Daphne launched the first big push processing the eDNA samples from this past summer's field efforts by our collaborators at ADF&G, TCC and USFWS.
2021116- Exciting developments in our collaborative research on Tiokowe / Hoolie (Spirinchus thaleichthys) with the Salish Sea Research Center. From Brandi Kamermans:
1. On 11/02/2021, the “Hoolie eDNA team” filtered water samples when the tide was highest. Based on DNA extracted from samples collected at Fish Point, Hoolies were present when using the Hoolie Taqman assay. The Ct values are below the limit of quantification. LNR fisherman, Jeff Solomon, had not yet begun fishing for Hoolies.
2. On 11/03/2021 the first Hoolie was caught by LNR fisherman, Jeff Solomon. The tide was outgoing at the time of capture. This Hoolie was a male. No eDNA sampling was done on the Nooksack on this day, only marine sampling was done during the low tide. An egg survey was conducted and samples were collected at Hovander, Slater Bridge Marine Drive Bridge. No eggs were detected.
Here is a fuller description of the project and its goals by Brandi.