Current Team Members

Ellen Martinsen, Ph.D. (she/her), Lab Head

Lecturer, Department of Biology, University of Vermont

Collections Manager, UVM Natural History Collections

Research Fellow, Center for Conservation Genomics, Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute

Ellen has been working with wildlife since childhood, having first started as a volunteer at a wildlife center. Her research interests center on host-parasite-vector ecology and evolution, wildlife disease, and conservation. Through broad collaboration and the integration of field, microscopy, and genetic methods, she has pursued the study of pathogen diversity, distribution, transmission, and host switching in wildlife and vector (mosquito and tick) hosts worldwide. Currently, her work focuses on pathogen spillover into naive host taxa including collection animals at zoological parks, host species of conservation concern, non-native wildlife species (including the House Sparrow in Ellen’s hand in picture), non-adapted wildlife species including those at northern latitudes, and tick-borne pathogens. When not chasing down new pathogens, Ellen can be found playing with her family or pack of rescue dogs.

Ericka Griggs, PhD Student, NSF Graduate Research Fellow (she/her)

Ericka’s love of loons and interests in wildlife health, disease, and conservation brought her to the lab after completing her master’s degree at Western Connecticut State University studying environmental and climate related stresses in breeding Common Loons. For her PhD research, Ericka is exploring the impact of environmental contaminants and climate change on pathogen infection dynamics in a diversity of bird taxa including loons and eagles. When not in the field or lab, you can find Ericka spending time with her dog Marty. Ericka is shown here holding a day old Common Loon chick. Ericka is co-advised by Melissa Pespini.

Carlos Amissah, PhD student (he/him)

Carlos holds a master’s degree in Wildlife Management and a bachelor’s degree in Entomology and Wildlife both from the University of Cape Coast, Ghana. Carlos’ research is focused on the interactions between species and the environment and how this influences their distribution and survival. His current research focus is on the interactions between ticks, host species, pathogens, and the environment, and how this influences the prevalence of tick-borne pathogens. Before coming to Vermont, Carlos’ research was focused on how urban green space management and arthropod abundance influence the foraging success of Cattle egrets, Bubulcus ibis. Additionally, Carlos worked on factors influencing bird assemblages before and after harvest in crop fields. Outside of research, Carlos likes to watch real football, birdwatch, and enjoy good music. Carlos is co-advised by Nicholas Gotelli.

Lilo Schultz, Undergraduate researcher (they/them)

 Lilo is a senior Zoology major with a minor in Statistics. For their senior research project, Lilo is investigating coinfection rates in blacklegged ticks ( Ixodes scapularis ) of Bartonella spp. with other tick-borne pathogens, including Borrelia burgdorferi (Lyme disease), Babesia microti (Babesiosis), and Anaplasma phagocytophilum (Anaplasmosis). Their research interests include parasitology, zoonotic spillover, and the interactions of community composition and wildlife disease dynamics. Outside of the lab, Lilo enjoys running, hiking, and crocheting. 

Sydney Collet-Callahan, Undergraduate researcher (she/her)

Sydney is a senior Biological Science major with a minor in Chemistry. Sydney started in the lab her junior year studying the diversity of vector-borne blood parasites in Vermont aquatic turtles. For her senior research project, Sydney is looking at tick-borne pathogen detectability in small mammal species. Her research interests include zoonotic spillover, the effect of climate and environmental change on wildlife disease and parasite infection, and epidemiology. Outside of the lab, Sydney teaches kids movement classes at the YMCA, and volunteers at the UVM medical center. In her spare time, she loves to hike, run, bike, and play intramural sports.

Isabella Soddhu, Undergraduate researcher (she/her)

Isabella is a senior majoring in applied ecology with minors in wildlife biology and writing. Her academic interests include avian ecology, scientific communication, and disease ecology. Using light microscopy to scan blood smears, she is investigating a potential correlation between infection levels of the vector-borne parasite Leucocytozoon and elevated mercury levels in Common Loons. Outside of her studies, Isabella enjoys crocheting and watercoloring birds

Eileen Rezendes, Undergraduate researcher

Eileen is a senior Biology major with a minor in Chemistry and Philosophy. In the lab, Eileen has learned how to identify vector-borne parasites of birds by light microscopy and is looking at the correlation between mercury levels and Leucocytozoon parasite infection in Common Loons. Eileen’s biological interests include the intersection of public health and microbiology, specifically parasitology and bacteriology. This past summer, Eileen interned as a microbiologist at the Vermont Department of Health lab this past summer. Outside of the lab, Eileen lifeguards at the YMCA and leads TriBeta, the biological Honors Society at UVM. 

Hanna and Lena, Scientists in training

Hanna and Lena are naturalists and budding scientists and provide enthusiasm and entertainment to everyone in the lab and field. Lena is currently studying the incidence of ticks on toads and Hanna is a major asset in the field assisting with mist netting of songbirds.

Ruby Higgins, Undergraduate Researcher (she/her)

Ruby (’25) spent three years in the lab (she started as a sophomore) and was a whiz at the light microscope and finding and identifying avian blood parasites in blood smears. For her senior project, Ruby studied the relationships between life history traits and vector-borne pathogen sharing in waterfowl species.

Pia Carman, Undergraduate Researcher (she/her)

Pia (’25) was both a Biological Science and Animal Science major at UVM interested in zoonoses, spillover events in wildlife, and wildlife conservation. In the lab, Pia assisted in research on the spillover of avian malaria parasites into Common Loons and projects investigating tick-borne pathogens in small mammals. Pia was offered early acceptance into the Tufts DVM program.

Emma Privett, Undergraduate researcher (she/her)

Emma (’25) majored in Biological Sciences and studied Heterosporis, a microsporidian parasite impacting yellow perch in Lake Champlain for her senior research project.

Lauren Berkley, MS (she/her)

Lauren graduated with her master’s degree from the lab in May of 2024. Lauren’s interests surround wildlife disease ecology, wildlife conservation, and One Health. Lauren is motivated to understand disease-related threats to vulnerable species in order to inform wildlife management and public health decisions. For her master’s thesis research, Lauren focused on vector-borne cervid pathogens including tick and mosquito vectored pathogens of white-tailed deer and moose across the Northeast. Lauren is now an APHL-CDC Laboratory Vector-borne and Zoonotic Disease Fellow based at the Vermont Department of Health Laboratory focusing on rabies and eastern equine encephalitis (EEE).

Brayden Hall, Undergraduate Researcher (he/him)

Brayden is an Animal Science major with minors in Zoology and Wildlife Biology. Brayden researched vector-borne blood parasites in birds of prey (shown here holding a Red-tailed Hawk). His research interests include spillover, conservation biology, wildlife diseases, and the decline of the American Kestrel. Brayden plans to continue to graduate school and possibly go on to veterinary school or a research field in epidemiology.

Olivia Biasetti, Undergraduate researcher (she/her)

Olivia (’24) majored in Animal Sciences with minors in Wildlife Biology and Zoology. Olivia’s major interests are disease ecology, zoonotic diseases, pathogen spillover, and herpetology. For her senior research project, Olivia investigated the relationships between environmental variables and infection levels of Anaplasma phagocytophilum, the agent of the disease Anaplasmosis, in reservoir hosts and ticks, focusing on a One Health approach. Olivia is now in graduate school investigating co-infections in amphibians at Purdue University.

Anna Hinkel, Undergraduate researcher (she/her)

Anna (’24) majored in Biological Sciences with an interest in zoonotic diseases and veterinary medicine. She’s worked with a variety of organisms, including horses, bacteria, dogs, and cats. For her senior research project, Anna investigated the potential reservoir hosts of a variety of tick-borne pathogens, screening a dozen small mammal species. Anna now works at a veterinary clinic and is an expert at finding tick-borne infections in the dogs in her practice by light microscopy.

Sam Cranston, Undergraduate researcher (he/him)

Sam (’23) started in the lab his junior year as his research interests surround vector-borne diseases. For Sam’s senior research project, he investigated co-infections in Vermont blacklegged ticks. Sam spent the summer scouring the Vermont landscape for black-legged (deer) tick nymphs and two semesters in the lab work screening them for pathogens. Sam is pictured here conducting a necropsy on a juvenile Common Loon (looking for signs of malaria). After graduation in Spring 2023, Sam started as a research associate in a research lab at Boston University/Boston Medical Center looking into the genetics of Sickle Cell Trait and human longevity. Sam is now a PhD student in the Biomedical Science (PiBS) program at Boston University

Matt Heilbronn, Undergraduate researcher (he/him)

Matt’s (’23) research interests in emerging infectious disease, spillover, zoonoses, and disease ecology brought him to the lab during his sophomore year. Matt majored in Microbiology with minors in Wildlife Biology and Zoology. Matt helped screen Vermont caught mosquitoes for malaria parasites in the lab and also trapped and identified local mosquitoes at various field sites. For his senior research project, Matt studied the spillover of avian malaria parasites into non-native and naive host species including House Sparrows. After graduating in Spring 2023, Matt worked in the UVM Medical School’s Vaccine Testing Center helping with trials of the much anticipated and long awaited Lyme vaccine. Matt’s is now onto his next adventure which includes working for the Peace Corps in Cameroon aiding in public health measures including malaria and HIV prevention, education, and treatment.

Alyssa Neuhaus, MS (she/her)

Alyssa successfully defended her master’s thesis (Spring 2022) and is now officially a Master of Science! Alyssa started in the lab in 2019 as a junior undergraduate student majoring in Biology interested in wildlife conservation. For her senior Honor’s project she investigated the malaria parasites of the steeply declining Saltmarsh Sparrow across its breeding range and the relationship between environmental mercury exposure and susceptibility to infection (now published in Ornithological Applications). Alyssa then continued in the lab for a master’s project and switched her focus to loons after spending a summer as a field biologist for the Loon Preservation Committee in New Hampshire. For her master’s research, Alyssa investigated the diversity and distribution of malaria parasites of Common Loons across the southern edge of their breeding range as well as the mosquito vectors responsible for transmission of these deadly parasites. Alyssa now works for Addgene in Boston where she is happily developing new research methods. Alyssa is shown here holding a Common Loon chick.

Karli Fletcher, Tufts DVM Student and Visiting Scientist (she/her)

We were very fortunate to have Karli, a veterinary student at Tufts University, join us for the summer of 2022. Karli helped with the loon malaria mortality project including diving into archived tissues stored at Tufts University to access samples from necropsied loons across the Northeast from the last 20 years. Karli also helped with the PCR screening of these tissues to unveil the historical presence and impact of malaria on Common Loons. Karli also worked alongside Vermont Center for Ecostudies loon biologists to help monitor breeding loons in Vermont. Karli’s interests and background center around wildlife health and disease.

Erik Gonzalez, Undergraduate researcher (he/him)

Erik (’24) majored in Biological Sciences with interests in smaller scale things such as viruses, bacteria, and parasites, as well as disease ecology and research.

Sarah Weiss, Undergraduate researcher, UVM (she/her)

Due to Sarah’s passion for all things marine it was easy to rope her into doing her senior research project on Common Loons as they spend half of the year on open ocean and half of the year mainland to breed on freshwater ponds and lakes. Sarah screened a large sample of Common Loons from sites across the northern US for Apicomplexan blood parasites including the malaria parasites. She also investigated the relationship between blood mercury levels and infection status with her preliminary findings suggesting a positive correlation. Sarah is now a Master’s student in the Department of Biology at Syracuse University studying the surface foraging strategies of humpback whales.

Yesha Stresha, Undergraduate researcher, Christopher Newport University (she/her)

For a summer research internship, Yesha assisted in the field and lab methods involved in an investigation of parasite spillover between wild birds and collection birds at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute’s National Zoological Park in Washington, D.C.. In the field she trapped and collected mosquitoes amongst Greater Rheas, Asian elephants, and Clouded leopards. In the lab she scanned blood smears and extracted DNA from hundreds of wild and collection birds. Yesha went on to complete a master’s degree at the George Mason University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, work as a microbiologist for the US Geological Survey, and is now a Bioinformatics Scientist at the FDA.

Neil Thompson, Undergraduate researcher, UVM (he/him)

Neil conducted his senior research project on the malaria parasites of forest birds of the Dominican Republic. Through light microscopy, PCR, and gene sequencing, Neil discovered a diversity of malaria parasites in DR birds including endemic parasites in endemic bird species as well as more widely distributed parasites in both endemic and migratory bird species pointing to the possible spillover of parasites from migratory birds to endemic birds. Neil then completed his PhD in salmon genetics at Oregon State University, worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the National Marine Fisheries Service at NOAA, and then landed as a Research Geneticist for the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Agricultural Research Service (ARS) in Oregon.

Benjamin Blumberg, Undergraduate researcher, UVM (he/him)

Ben started in the lab as a junior undergraduate student very eager to get involved in the study of malaria parasites of birds (and lizards as shown here). For his senior research project, Ben investigated the malaria parasites of California birds, discovering many new bird-parasite associations as well as a high diversity of parasites. Ben went on to obtain his PhD in Molecular Microbiology and Immunology at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health studying mosquito microbiota and its influence on innate immune system and defense against Plasmodium parasites. Ben is now a postdoctoral fellow in Medicinal Chemistry at Rutgers University.

William Pinard, Undergraduate researcher, UVM (he/him)

As part of a research internship, Will looked at Leucocytozoon parasites in Vermont birds. These parasites are transmitted by blackflies (family Simuliidae) and are quite amazing to glance at under the light microscope due to their diversity in shapes and sizes. Will discovered a high prevalence and great abundance of Leucocytozoon species in Vermont’s birds including owls, turkeys, and songbirds. After graduating from UVM, Will completed a master’s degree at George Mason University, went on to work as a Program Assistant for the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and is now at Sandia National Laboratories in sunny New Mexico.

Jessica Waite, Undergraduate researcher, UVM (she/her)

Jessi was in the lab for many years as an undergraduate at UVM. She worked first as a volunteer, then as a research intern, and finally conducted her own senior Honor’s research project. Jessi is a native Vermonter and loves being out in the field. She assisted in the mist netting of thousands of Vermont birds of over 100 different species as part of an avian malaria parasite survey. In the lab she was a whiz at molecular methods and gene sequence analysis. For Jessi’s senior thesis, she looked at the identification of subgenera of malaria parasites by both morphological and molecular methods. Jessi then switched to vectors and completed a PhD in the Clayton & Bush Lab at the University of Utah studying the dynamics between the malaria parasites of doves and their louse vector hosts (Family Hippoboscidae). Jessi then worked as a postdoctoral fellow in the Thomas Lab at Penn State University and the Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics studying the mosquito vectors of human malaria parasites. Jessi returned to her home state of Vermont to work as a Scientific Project Manager at Green Mountain Antibodies and is now a Grant Proposal Developer at UVM.

Alyeska, Lab and field mascot extraordinaire

Ally assisted in the support and protection of all those around her in the lab and in the field.