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Research Associate and Associate Curator
B.A., 1986, Biology, Illinois
Wesleyan University
M.S., 1988, Biological Sciences, Illinois State University
Ph.D., 1991, Plant Pathology, Kansas State University
As of August 1st, Steve left INVAM and accepted a faculty position at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, where he will be responsible for teaching Mycology, Biological Diversity, and perhaps Plant Pathology. He also will continue research on the ecology and systematics of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. He can be reached at the following address:
Steve was Associate Curator of INVAM, and in that capacity he supervised propagation and storage of all INVAM accessions on a day-to-day basis. With his abiding interest in computers, he was largely responsible for developing a peer-to-peer network in rooms on two floors in Brooks Hall devoted to INVAM activities. He also established the INVAM web site and was involved in construction and maintenance of databases tracking culture information, orders, and usage.
In addition to the above-mentioned duties (which took a considerable amount of time), Steve also was highly productive in his research efforts. His prior training and interest in ecology of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi was a solid foundation on which to carry out more in-depth taxonomic studies. His work led to a revision of morphological character concepts in Gigaspora within a developmental context, which resulted in a monograph of the genus. He also compared fatty acid methyl ester (FAME's) profiles of glomalean fungi in all genera, but focused most intensively from the start on species in Gigaspora and Scutellospora, where developmental studies also were being carried out by other lab members. With frequent visits by Dr. Jim Bever (now at Argonne National Lab), a highly competent population ecologist, Steve became interested in studying population genetics of morphological character inheritance in selected isolates of the species Glomus clarum.
Steve's contribution to INVAM was all-encompassing. Without any doubt, this contribution was significant in making INVAM the collection it is today. He will be difficult to replace!