PhD Students
Christian Ching, MSci

Christian is co-supervised by Dr Kelvin Peh from University of Southampton and Dr Ben Price from the NHM. His PhD project is entitled "Assessing the health of tropical riparian ecosystems using remote sensing of freshwater biodiversity" and will involve fieldwork with collaborators in Cambodia. His research is funded by a University of Southampton Presidential Scholarship and partnership with Conservation International. 

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Masters Students
Masaya Hayashikawa

Masaya is co-supervised by Dr. Jim Labisko and is studying fluctuating asymmetry in endangered midwife toads (Alytes) as part of the Zoology MSci at University College London. 
Aubane Carré de Malberg

Aubane is studying mitochondrial genome evolution in island speckled rattlesnakes as part of the Biodiversity, Evolution & Conservation MRes at University College London. 
Rebecca Higham

Becca is co-supervised by Dr. Gabriela Bittencourt-Silva and studying myxozoan parasites of amphibians as part of the Biodiversity, Evolution & Conservation MRes at University College London. ​
Joseph Rees

Joe is co-supervised by Dr. Ashwini Mohan and is studying gecko skull evolution in relation to ecology as part of the Biosystematics MRes at Imperial College London.  Joe will be starting a Ph.D. at University of Lincoln in late 2023. 
Alumni
PhD Students
Karla Alujević, PhD

Karla was co-supervised by Dr Susana Clusella-Trullas from Stellenbosch University and Dr Michael Logan from University of Nevada, Reno. She studied a species of lizard (Agama atra) from South Africa with laboratory physiological assays, field observations of behaviour and population genomics. Her research at the NHM was funded by National Research Foundation (South Africa) and the Systematics Association.

She is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Nevada, Reno! 

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Masters Students
Emily Buckingham, MRes

Emily completed her MRes in Biosystematics at Imperial College London in 2019. Her project was entitled 'Range expansion of the redbacked salamander (Plethodon cinereus) in Long Island, New York'. Her population genomic research was published in Ecology and Evolution! 
Marco Crotti, MSc

Marco completed his MSc in Taxonomy and Biodiversity at Imperial College London in 2015 and was co-supervised by Dr David Gower from the NHM. His project was entitled 'Genome-wide RAD sequence data from an east African frog species: the impact of missing data and assembly methods on phylogeographic inference' which was the basis for a manuscript in Zoologica Scripta! He is currently a postdoctoral researcher at University of Glasgow.

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Naomi Berkowitz, MRes

Naomi completed an University College London MRes in Biodiversity, Evolution & Conservation focused on georeferencing natural history specimens from South America in 2018. She was co-supervised by Dr Natalie Cooper from the NHM.

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Ryan F. A. Brewer, MRes

Ryan completed a University College London MRes project entitled 'Phylogeny of the Caeciliidae based on fresh and vintage DNA' and was co-supervised by Dr. Mark Wilkinson from the NHM.  Ryan is currently a Ph.D. student at Naturalis in the Netherlands.

Naturalis
Jack Davies, MRes

Jack completed his MRes in Biodiversity, Evolution and Conservation Biology at University College London in 2017. He was co-supervised by Dr Natalie Cooper from the NHM with a project entitled 'Assessing the accuracy of IUCN range maps of amphibians using amphibian type locality data of collections at the Natural History Museum, London'. Jack is currently a ​Teacher of Science at Burntwood School.
Shakuntala Devi Gopal, MRes 

Devi completed her MRes in Biodiversity, Evolution and Conservation Biology at University College London in 2015 and was co-supervised by Dr Bruno Simóes from University of Adelaide. Her project was entitled 'Geographic variation in vision genes from closely related North American frog populations with comments on rhodopsin evolution in amphibians'.  She is currently a postdoctoral researcher at University of Arizona. 
Tom J. M. Jameson

Tom completed his MPhil at Cambridge University, Sidney Sussex College and was co-supervised by Dr Jason Head. He studied direct-developing frogs from Mexico in a dissertation project entitled 'Diversity, Conservation and Evolution of the Craugastor mexicanus species series'. His research was published in Herpetological Monographs! He also worked at Chester Zoo! ​Tom is currently a Ph.D. student at Cambridge University. 
Luigi Manuelli, MRes
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Luigi completed his MRes in Biosystematics at Imperial College London in 2017. His project was entitled 'Taxonomy and molecular systematics of the frog species group Craugastor mexicanus'. We also collaborated on a phylogenetic study of another frog (Genus Niceforonia) that was published in Zootaxa! He is currently a PhD student at University of Geneva.

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Christopher McCabe, MRes 

Chris completed his MRes in Biodiversity, Evolution and Conservation Biology at University College London in 2016. He was co-supervised by Dr. Simon Maddock from University of Wolverhampton with a project entitled 'Separated by a mountain? Comparative phylogeography of herpetofauna in a Honduran national park'. He is currently a Ph.D. student at University of Bristol studying the evolution of mammal venom with Prof. Emily Rayfield.

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Longson Pang, MRes

Longson completed his MRes in Biodiversity, Evolution and Conservation Biology at University College London in 2016. His project was co-supervised by Dr Jesse Meik from Tarleton State University and entitled 'Mitogenomic evolutionary dynamics in insular speckled rattlesnakes'. His research formed the basis for a poster that was presented at SMBE 2017 in Austin, Texas. He is currently a Ph.D. student at the University of Tokyo. 
Alice Pawlik, MRes

Alice completed her MRes in Ecology, Evolution and Conservation at Imperial College London in 2018. Her project was co-supervised by Dr Natalie Cooper from the NHM and was entitled,'Using museum specimens and spatial data to inform conservation management of salamanders: An investigation utilising the Natural History Museum's collection and the IUCN Red List'. She is currently a Ph.D. student at the University of Exeter. 

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Melissa Reid, MRes

Mel completed her MRes in Biodiversity, Evolution and Conservation Biology at University College London in 2017. She was co-supervised with Dr David Gower from the NHM with a project entitled 'Phylogeography of filesnakes (Acrochordidae), using mitochondrial and nuclear DNA'
Anwesha Saha, MRes

Mimi completed her MRes in Biodiversity Evolution and Conservation Biology at University College London in 2015 and was co-supervised by Dr Eleanor Adamson from the Fishmonger's Company. Her project was entitled 'Population genetics of Seychelles caecilian amphibians using microsatellites developed from Next Generation Sequence data' and was the basis for a paper published in Conservation Genetics Resources! She worked at Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and Environment in Bangalore, India and is currently a Ph.D. student at the Polish Academy of Sciences. 

Research Gate
Samuel Shrimpton, MRes

Sam  completed  a University College London MRes project entitled 'The developmental scaling of eye size in frogs' and was co-supervised by Dr Kate Thomas and Dr David Gower from the NHM.  His research was published in Evolutionary Ecology! Sam is currently a Ph.D. student at Queen Mary University of London.
Sarah-Jane Smith, MRes

Sarah-Jane completed her MRes in Biosystematics at Imperial College London in 2018. She was co-supervised by Dr Christian Cox from Georgia Southern University and her project was entitled 'Morphological adaptations to dietary specialism in Tantilla and relatives (Squamata: Colubridae)'. 

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Amartya Tashi Mitra, MRes

Amartya investigated lens shape evolution across ontogeny and phylogeny in anuran amphibians as part of his University College London MRes course. He earned his MRes in 2020. He was co-supervised by Dr Kate Thomas and Dr David Gower from the NHM. His research was published in Proceedings B!  Amartya is currently a Ph.D. student at University of Cincinnati. 

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Andrea L. Varela-Jaramillo, MRes

Andrea completed her MRes in Biodiversity, Evolution and Conservation Biology at University College London in 2017. She worked on a project entitled 'Sequence capture of ultraconserved elements can detect cryptic diversity among South American hylid frogs' which was an extension of her undergraduate work from Ecuador. Andrea's laboratory work with UCEs also contributed to a study on microhylid anurans which was published in Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution.  Andrea is currently a Ph.D. student at University of Leipzig. 
Tom Weeks, MSc

Tom completed his MSc at University College London in 2018. He was co-supervised by Dr Natalie Cooper from the NHM with a project entitled 'Mismatches in East African amphibian type-localities and current distributions'. Tom is currently a Ph.D. student at Imperial College London. 
Interested in joining our lab?

All positions in our lab are funded from outside the museum. Please contact Jeff if you are interested in collaborating on a proposal to fund a new position.