The salamander species Batrachoseps stebbinsi is an underrepresented subject in morphological studies. Authors have noted morphological differences and genetic divergence between northern and southern populations. This has led to speculation as to whether or not the northern and southern populations are separate species due to their observed morphological differences and the apparent gap in their distribution. To date, no formal analysis of range-wide morphological data has been published. This study aims to quantify the morphology and shape differences (body and limb proportions) between northern and southern populations of B. stebbinsi. The role of sexual dimorphism and size at maturity will be included in the analysis. Whether selection is driving the observed variation in color and shape differences is not yet known. Statistical difference was found between populations.
This poster has been presented at the 20205 Amphibian Task Force Conference and the 2025 UCSB Undergraduate Research Colloquium.
Although taxonomists have access to a massive amount of information, accessing this data is a major hassle for researchers and can be a barrier to entry for aspiring taxonomists. We created a chatbot for bee research that stores some of this information (provided by our advisors) and uses it to respond to user queries. Our approach was to implement a multimodal Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) pipeline, which matches user queries with relevant context in our bee data, returning answers based on related text chunks, along with images. This method yielded great results, with our advisors evaluating the chatbot highly compared to other prominent Large Language Models (LLMs). We are hosting the model as a website locally, and plan publish it in coordination with our advisors after more rigorous evaluation of its performance. This poster was presented at the UCSB Data Science Initiative Capstone Project Showcase in 2025
The University of California, Santa Barbara’s Cheadle Center for Biodiversity and Ecological Restoration is distinctive in its dual mission of ecological restoration and natural history collection curation. The Center offers an experiential undergraduate course called Introduction to Curation of Natural History Collections, which provides hands-on learning activities in the Cheadle Center’s invertebrate, vertebrate, and vascular plant collections. Each quarter, the class alternates between professors and collections, and students can take it multiple times, allowing them to gain experience in different collections from professors with different backgrounds. Undergraduate students are fundamental to supporting the Cheadle Center’s mission of restoration and conservation through the curation class as well as successive opportunities. After completing the course, students can apply for competitive curatorial internships that provide experience in menteeship. This opportunity teaches students how to acquire internships and develop professional interpersonal and technical skills, offering a valuable introduction to the professional world of Natural History Collections curation. The collection curation course is a unique opportunity for students to determine whether they are well suited to the field. This benefits the Cheadle Center because it invests in students that are already committed to and passionate about curation work. Missing from this curatorial experience, though, is taxonomic training. While inessential, and allowing for more students to get involved in the work, this is a disadvantage for those who intend to enter the Natural History Collections field. Taxonomic training is a barrier to entry and makes a major difference in hiring for career positions. However, taxonomy is no longer taught at the University and inaccessible to non-Biology students. Online taxonomy workshops typically have limited space and prioritize professional seniority, but reserving some space for early career students would aid their professional preparedness. The Cheadle Center is considering developing taxon training or supporting student participation in existing programs.
Presented at SPNHC 2025
The Cheadle Center for Biodiversity and Ecological Restoration (Cheadle Center) at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) restores North Campus Open Space (NCOS), an area previously converted from wetlands and uplands to a golf course. Invasive plants are a persistent problem on site and must be managed using restoration techniques, but localized methods like hand or flame weeding can be time and resource intensive. Short-term rotational sheep grazing was utilized to reduce thatch and invasive species seed banks and biomass to encourage native species growth in the spring. To investigate immediate impacts of grazing on the abundance of key species and assess the efficacy of the sheep grazing regime in reducing thatch and invasive species biomass, pre-grazing and post-grazing biomass samples were collected and compared. The seed viability of key species was also evaluated by collecting sheep pellets, spreading them over soil-covered flats, and observing plant growth from January-May 2025.
Bee wings experience mechanical stress and collisions over time through an accumulation of flying, foraging, mating, and predator attack events. As such, wing wear has been used as a measure for relative age in bees and has also been found to be related to an increased risk of mortality. This relationship allows wing wear to be used as an indicator for bee health of individual bees and of their respective colonies. Little is known about how additional factors–like size, sex, and diet breadth– contribute to wing wear in bees. The aim of this study is to investigate the variation in wing wear between mid-size Santa Barbara county specialist and generalist bees using two techniques: manual scoring and a computer vision model. This program is an image segmentation model that uses shape analysis data to assign a wing wear score from photographs. The study will also assess the accuracy of these computer generated scores relative to manual scoring and the reliability of these scores within and between bee species. The information derived from this study can inform conservation efforts, particularly for specialist bees that are more vulnerable to habitat loss and climate change which reduces availability of their mutualistic plant species. The application of computer vision models automate wing wear scoring and may be extended to conduct additional wing wear research on bee health and behavior with respect to location, wing structure, and more.
The genus Hybanthus of the Violet Family (Violaceae) is non-monophyletic, meaning that not all species of Hybanthus share a most recent common ancestor. Previous phylogenetic analysis in the Violet Family suggested that Hybanthus concolor from eastern North America was resolved as a sister taxon to a clade of two Hybanthus species from the Caribbean region (Wahlert et al., 2014). The two clades display distinct differences in morphology, climate, and geographic distribution. In this project, we conducted expanded DNA sequencing of North American and Caribbean Hybanthus species to test the hypothesis that these two groups represent distinct evolutionary genera.
Rare plants are often dependent on pollinators to maintain their populations. In some cases, the pollinators themselves are of high conservation value, resulting in a system that has inherently high value for conservation. The North Campus Open Space (NCOS) at UCSB is home to such a system, where the Federally Endangered Salt Marsh Bird’s Beak (Chloropyron maritimum) is pollinated by recently listed Crotch’s Bumblebee (Bombus crotchii) along with other bumblebee, and insect species.
Monitoring pollination events is time-consuming, and researchers are looking to automated cameras to capture images of pollination events and machine learning to help extract pollinator identifications from the captured images.
Presented at the URCA Poster Colloquium 5/14/2025
Damage to bee wings commonly occurs during ecologically-essential foraging and flight activities of bees. Interactions and collisions with native environmental conditions such as wind and vegetation leave wings exposed to potential wear and tear. Morphological traits influence bee flight performance, as bees with larger body sizes demonstrate increased flight distance capacity and foraging range. We analyze the degree of wing wear as an indicator of these activities, predicting that larger bees will accumulate more wing damage from extended exposure to environmental wear. We imaged wings across bee species native to Santa Barbara County. By manually creating masks to isolate the wing, we trained a computer vision model with ground-truth data to identify pixels in wing images and separate them from the background. This image segmentation model allows for shape analysis and comparison of degree of wear in the wing’s margin across various species through this large-scale collection of qualitative data. We also created a manual wing wear scoring index to compare accuracy with this model. Genera such as Bombus and Xylocopa that tend to have larger body sizes are predicted to be assigned, on average, higher scores of wing wear compared with smaller species being assigned lower scores to indicate experiencing less wear. By comparing wear patterns, these correlations could offer insight on species resilience in their native habitats, suggesting that species with larger body sizes may be more vulnerable to environmental stresses that require more demanding flight and foraging efforts. This model could then have potential research applications as bioindicators of the local foraging ecology and environmental stress/fragmentation.
This poster was presented at the UCSB Undergraduate Research Symposium 2025, and at the UCSB URCA Poster Colloqium 2025.
Variance in body size of bees can affect multiple factors including pollination ability, floral handling, and response to evolving environmental conditions. Likewise, body size itself is influenced by a range of climate and location-specific environmental factors. Islands represent distinct habitats with unique ecological and climate conditions. Many animals differ drastically in body size in island habitats, but the extent to which this effect occurs in insects is unknown. This phenomenon is known as the “island rule” in which animals are considerably larger on islands when compared to their mainland counterparts. Recognizing these patterns enhances our understanding of how differing environmental conditions between islands and mainlands can drive long-term evolutionary changes in species. I measured body size for each specimen, accounting for sex and missing body parts. In this study, we drew data from the sweat bee, agapostemon subtilior, and measured their body size by mass. My findings suggested that insects, specifically agapostemon subtilior, have evolved to greater sizes on the mainland than on the island. These surprising findings both raise new questions and help clarify the role between habitat factors and body size variation in this important native pollinator.
This poster was presented at the UCSB EEMB Undergraduate Research Symposium 2025.
Macroinvertebrates play a key role in aquatic ecosystems as indicators due to their sensitivity to changes in environmental conditions. Regular macroinvertebrate sampling is conducted in the Deveroux slough at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) to monitor species abundance and diversity and assess the ecological health of the system. We examined how salinity and dissolved oxygen (D.O.) influenced the abundance and diversity of four macroinvertebrate species: Amphipods, Diptera Chirominid, Ostracods, and Copepods. We predict a higher abundance of invertebrates when salinity levels are low and D.O. levels are high. Samples were taken across sixteen (16) different sites at Deveroux Slough. Filter beakers and mesh sweep dipnets were used to collect samples, with algae and core samples taken by CCBER. Data was transferred to an Excel spreadsheet, and R Studio was used for data analysis. Amphipods and Chironomids were most abundant at low-salinity, moderate D.O sites, Ostracods at low to moderate salinity, high D.O sites, and Copepods at high salinity, high D.O sites. The slough has the most abundance when salinity is low and DO is moderate and when salinity and DO levels are high. This is likely due to the invertebrate biological niches fitting under either of those extremes. Tracking species abundance in the slough is critical for future restoration projects. Ongoing research still needs to be conducted to understand the ecosystem as it stands today, and will continue to do so in the future.
This poster was presented at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) EEMB Undergraduate Research Symposium on May 3rd, 2025.
