April 2026

In the News

Alums

• Plymale to lead Ouachita School of Natural Sciences
• College of Ag Sciences alumna's legacy: Research and growing global impact
• The Art and Science of Rearing Queen Bees

Bees

• It's OK to love all the bees (the honey bees, too)
• Penn State Extension bee monitoring workshop abuzz with new highlights on bees

Frost Museum

• Hexapod Haiku Challenge
• The Light Trap Winter Newsletter
• The McPheron Family Student Experience Endowment in the Department of Entomology & The McPheron Family Student Experience Fund at the Frost Entomological Museum

Spiders

• Friend, not foe: The health threat from spiders is low in Western Pennsylvania, experts say

Spotted Lanternfly

• Spotted lanternfly 'plague' expected to return with a vengeance

Webinars

• ‘Entomology 101' Webinar Series Offered by Penn State Extension

Awards and Accolades

Outstanding Graduate Student Awards

Photo Credit: Liam Jackson / Penn State. Creative Commons

Intercollege Graduate Student Outreach Achievement Award – Robert Witkowski

Photo Credit: Liam Jackson / Penn State. All Rights Reserved.

Distinguished Master's Thesis Award – Mia Esoldo

The annual recognition awards are sponsored by the Office of the President and administered by the Fox Graduate School.

Botanical Society of America

Photo Credit: Michael Tribone / Penn State. All Rights Reserved.

Bill Dahl Graduate Student Research Award - Shui Li Eu-Balint

Shui Li Eu-Balint, a graduate student in The Huck Institutes Intercollege Graduate Degree Program in Plant Biology, was awarded a Bill Dahl Graduate Student Research Award from the Botanical Society of America. Shui Li is co-mentored by Dr. Tanya Renner and Dr. John Tooker.

Outreach and Happenings

The Great Insect Fair Poster Preservation

As we make changes to the look-and-feel of the fifth floor in AgSci and Industries Building, some previous projects were removed and others were revitalized. Sarah Kania orchestrated the preservation of the Great Insect Fair posters that were once in the hallway by the Admin Office. The posters were removed during the modernization project and given new life in the recently updated Graduate Student Lounge. You can read about Sarah's preservation mission for the posters on the Entomology website.

Mia Bitman Spider Project

Previous Penn State undergraduate student Mia Bitman (Fall 2025), now a masters student in Education, worked on a project aimed at improving our collective understanding and appreciation of spiders in Pennsylvania. She generated a checklist of spider species found in the state, built a catalog of spider species represented in the Frost's collection, and created an illustrated field guide to common and interesting spiders found in Pennsylvania. This work was funded through the Maria Sibylla Merian Research and Outreach Program.

Publications

• The making of a queen: Hormonal regulation of female caste in the social bee Bombus impatiens, Insect Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Hasani, Seyed Ali Modarres, Derstine, Nathan, Santos, Priscila K.F., Amsalem, Etya, 2026
• Convergent evolution of hexenal isomerases in Lepidoptera and plants, Nature Ecology and Evolution, Lin, Yu Hsien, Wu, Bulah Chia hsiang, Sharaf, Abdoallah, Heijblom, Sophie Maartje Elisabeth, Prattis, Ilias, Tan, Ching Wen, Schilder, Rudolf J., Ali, Jared Gregory, Allmann, Silke, 2026
• New Records of Deer Keds (Diptera: Hippoboscidae: Lipoptena cervi L. and L. mazamae Rondani) in Eastern North America, Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington, Skvarla, Michael J., Green, Jody, Hogan, Phillip N., Jones, Lance E., Machtinger, Erika T., Mackay, Andrew J., Steckler, Teresa L., Sullivan, Cheryl Frank, Tufts, Danielle M., 2026
• Boosting Agriculture Career Readiness in STEM Through a Virtual Symposium, Journal of Youth Development, Windon, Suzanna, You, Hosung, Grozinger, Christina, Boyle, Natalie, Li-Byarlay, Hongmei, 2026
• Trade-offs in Defense Allocation: How Soil Legacy Modulates Plant- Herbivore- Predator Dynamics, Basic and Applied Ecology, Sujay M. Paranjape, Sahil V. Pawar, Annett Richter, Nathaniel McCartney, Gary W. Felton, Georg Jander, Jared G. Ali, 2026
• Persistent field soil legacies of cover crops influence maize quality and resistance to herbivory, Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment, Sujay M. Paranjape, Kayleigh C. Hauri, Nathaniel McCartney, Elizabeth Wagner, Annett Richter, Brosi Bradley, Jason Kaye, Georg Jander, Jared G. Ali, 2026