Arboretum Scientists | Visiting Scientists | DaRin Butz Interns | Research Interns | Putnam Fellows | Arboretum Award Recipients | Alumni | Research Publications
Arboretum Scientists
With state-of-the-art research and growth facilities nestled alongside over 16,000 living specimens (2,100 species), the Arnold Arboretum is uniquely positioned to ask broad and important questions in plant biology. Our scientists’ research is as diverse as our living collection, ranging from organismic and evolutionary biology, molecular and developmental biology, plant physiology, and ecological, environmental and biodiversity studies. Emphasizing our close relationship to the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology (OEB), many of our scientists have dual appointments in OEB and the Arboretum.
Faculty Fellows of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University contribute significantly to one or more of five areas central to the mission of the Arnold Arboretum: 1) Leading or collaborating on research based at the Arboretum, 2) Mentoring students and postdoctoral fellows based at the Arboretum, 3) Teaching Harvard courses based at the Arboretum, 4) Providing input on living or archival collections and landscape management, and 5) Creating outreach programs to share science and other scholarship with the public at the Arboretum.
Izzy Acevedo
Research Assistant, OEB, Hopkins Lab
Izzy Acevedo is a research assistant currently studying evolution and reinforcement in Texas wildflowers, though interested in life of all shapes and sizes. Izzy can usually be found in the research greenhouses, caring for Phlox as the Hopkins Lab investigate its flowering characteristics and mating systems. Izzy is passionate about environmental storytelling, visual art, and other creative forms of scientific communication.
Andrea Berardi
HUH Research Fellow
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Andrea Berardi is a HUH research fellow broadly interested in the processes of adaptation and speciation, with a particular focus on the role floral color in creating reproductive barriers. She is currently working on a project to understand the evolution of red flower color in North American Silene species, specifically whether access to hummingbird pollinators and/or polyploidy events played the biggest roles.
Carina Berlingeri
PhD Student, OEB, Taylor Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Carina Berlingeri is a PhD student in the Taylor lab. She is engaged in several projects studying how different global change drivers (nutrient pollution, disturbance, and rising CO2) alter belowground symbioses and plant resource-acquisition strategies.
Bridget Bickner
PhD Candidate, OEB, Hopkins Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Bridget Bickner is a PhD candidate in the Hopkins lab.
Alaina Bisson
Research Assistant, OEB, Taylor Lab
Grace Burgin
PhD Candidate, MSO, Hopkins Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Grace Burgin is a PhD candidate in the Hopkins lab.
Andrew Cameron
Research Assistant, OEB, Hopkins Lab
Nikhil Chari
PhD Student, OEB, Taylor Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Nikhil Chari, PhD student in the Taylor lab, is a biogeochemist interested in carbon and nutrient cycling governing terrestrial ecosystems. His focus is currently on the effects of elevated CO2 on root-soil interactions and soil carbon dynamics.
Lauren Church
Research Assistant, OEB, Taylor Lab
Lauren Church is a research assistant in the Taylor lab, and helps with sample processing, data analysis, as well as field work (her favorite part). Lauren completed her thesis in the Taylor lab looking at the impacts of fertilizer treatments on soil bacterial communities, plant health and soil nutrients. Her research interests include global change biology, environmental justice, and human-environmental interactions.
Peter Del Tredici
Senior Research Scientist Emeritus
Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
The research interests of Peter Del Tredici are wide ranging and mainly involve the interaction between woody plants and their environment. Recently, his investigations have expanded to include studies of spontaneous urban vegetation.
Michael Dosmann
Keeper of Living Collections
Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Michael Dosmann, keeper of living collections, guides the Arboretum’s stewardship and development of its collection of temperate woody species. His work explores new strategies and tactics aimed at improving collections management and enhancing the use of Arboretum collections for research. Additionally, he conducts research on the physiological ecology of woody plants and participates in floristic efforts through domestic and foreign plant exploration.
Daniel Faccini
PhD Student, OEB, Friedman Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Daniel is a PhD student in the Friedman lab. Fascinated with the morphological evolution of plants, he is interested in studying plants from an organismal perspective, integrating the developmental, morphological, biogeographical, and ecological patterns to understand how the extraordinary diversity of plant forms has come to be. His research focuses on plant genera of the Canary Islands.
Anna Feller
Swiss National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow, OEB, Hopkins Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Anna Feller is a Swiss National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellow in the Hopkins lab. She focuses on understanding the processes and mechanisms that generate and maintain biological diversity and how species evolve and persist. In the Hopkins lab, she is studying reproductive isolation and gene flow between several closely related lineages of Phlox flowers that all occur in geographic proximity.
James Fortin
Research Assistant, Friedman Lab and Weld Hill Labs
Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
James Fortin started at the Arboretum as a DaRin Butz intern (’22), where he studied the morphology and development of pores on the gametophytes of hornworts (Anthocerotae). While continuing this research, he is also currently investigating potential interparental genetic conflict and imprinting in Illicium parviflorum, a relative of star anise and member of a clade basal to most flowering plants.
William (Ned) Friedman
Arnold Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology
Director of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Faculty Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Ned Friedman is interested in the organismic interfaces between developmental, phylogenetic, and evolutionary biology. The Friedman lab explores how patterns of morphology, anatomy, and reproductive biology have evolved through the modification of developmental processes.
Austin Garner
Postdoctoral fellow, OEB, Hopkins Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Austin Garner is a postdoctoral fellow in the Hopkins lab studying speciation in Phlox.
Calvin Heslop
PhD Student, OEB, Taylor Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Calvin Heslop is a PhD student in the Taylor lab. He is an ecosystem ecologist interested in the biotic and abiotic controls on nutrient cycling in terrestrial environments. His research focuses on how the N fixing shrub Siberian alder influences community composition, N cycling, and C balance in arctic Alaska.
N. Michele Holbrook
Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology
Charles Bullard Professor of Forestry
Faculty Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
The Holbrook lab focuses on how the transport of water and solutes through the vascular system influences ecological, evolutionary and physiological processes.
Robin Hopkins
John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Natural Sciences
Associate Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology
Faculty Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Robin Hopkins is interested in natural selection and the process of speciation. The Hopkins lab studies color variation in Phlox with a growing focus on reproductive incompatibility between emerging species and understanding the key evolutionary forces at work.
Elena Kramer
Bussey Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology
Harvard College Professor
Faculty Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Lindsay McCulloch
NOAA Climate and Global Change Postdoctoral Fellow, Taylor Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Lindsay McCulloch is a NOAA Climate and Global Change postdoctoral fellow working in the Taylor lab. Lindsay’s work focuses on the role plant-microbial symbioses play in the biogeochemical cycling and function of tropical forests, and how these processes may affect global carbon and nutrient cycling.
Cecilia (Ceci) Prada Cordero
Postdoctoral Fellow, OEB, Taylor Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Cecilia Prada Cordero is a postdoctoral fellow in the Taylor lab. Ceci focuses on the influence of abiotic and biotic factors on tree species composition, distribution, and biogeochemical processes, with a specific emphasis on filling research gaps in soil-plant-fungi interactions in tropical forests.
Faye Rosin
Director of Research Facilitation
Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
The research interests of Faye Rosin bear on investigating how gene expression is regulated and the consequences of that regulation at the molecular, cellular, and developmental levels.
Christina Steinecke
PhD Student, OEB, Hopkins Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Christina Steinecke is an evolutionary biologist broadly interested in major evolutionary transitions in plants and the conditions that produce them. More specifically, she is interested in identifying the unique forces that drive the enormous diversity in plant reproductive strategies. In the Hopkins lab, she is working to elucidate the causes and consequences of hybridization, polyploidy, and contrasting life history strategies in Texan Phlox species.
Benton Taylor
Assistant Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology
Faculty Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Benton Taylor focuses on how plants respond-to and influence their environments, particularly in view of global change. Although the primary focus of the Taylor lab is at the ecosystem scale, the research questions require viewing plants at individual as well as community scales toward a better understanding of the role of plants in global processes.
Camilo Villouta
Putnam Fellow
Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Winter presents significant challenges to long lived perennial species, and in particular, to the reproductive buds that form before winter. Trees have developed different strategies for surviving winter and ensuring reproductive success. As a Putnam Fellow, Camilo Villouta focuses on understanding the tradeoff between different survival strategies that trees employ with successful reproduction in the spring. This work will add insight to how climate change may impact temperate woody species.
Felix Wu
Postdoctoral Fellow, OEB, Hopkins Lab
Fellow of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Felix Wu is broadly interested in understanding the mechanistic basis of evolutionary processes—in particular, mutation and speciation—as well as the differential impact of these processes across the tree of life. In the Hopkins lab, he is researching the history of hybridization between three species of Texas annual Phlox and developing genomic tools to help us answer these questions.
Arboretum Scientists | Visiting Scientists | DaRin Butz Interns | Research Interns | Putnam Fellows | Arboretum Award Recipients | Alumni | Research Publications
Our Visiting and Associated Scientists
In addition to our staff scientists, the Arnold Arboretum shares its resources, the state-of-the-art research facilities, living collection, herbarium, plant records, library and archives, with scholars at Harvard and around the world. Formally-affiliated scientists are introduced below, but we open up our resources to an extensive network of researchers for a diverse range of research projects and offer fellowships, awards and internships. Learn more about requesting research access to the Arboretum living collections, research facilities, or library.
Dave Boufford
Senior Research Scientist, Harvard University Herbaria
Associate, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Dave Boufford has been leading exhibitions to Asia since 1977. Along with several colleagues, he is undertaking a survey of the plant and fungal diversity of the Hengduan Mountain region in southwestern China, one of the world’s hotspots of biodiversity. His expeditions in unexplored and underexplored regions complement collections made in the first half of the twentieth century by Joseph Rock, TT Yü, C. W. Wang, R. C. Ching, and others.
Anthony Brach
Research Associate, Harvard University Herbaria
Associate, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Anthony R. Brach has a strong interest in the plants of Asia including their taxonomy, identification, and ecology. As an editor Missouri Botanical Garden and of the Flora of China Project, he is interested in exploring the digitization and creation of web-based floras and interactive identification keys.
David Des Marais
Assistant Professor, MIT
Visiting Scholar, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
The research of David Des Marais focuses on how plants interact with the environment and the variation in these interactions between species. Understanding how plants adapt to the local environment can increase our ability to conserve plant populations.
Pam Diggle
Professor and Department Head, University of Connecticut
Associate, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Ailene Ettinger
Quantiative Ecologist, The Nature Conservatory
2014 Putnam Fellow and Visiting Scholar, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Ailene Ettinger, former Arnold Arboretum Putnam Fellow, focuses on predicting the response and sensitivity of plants to a changing climate. By examining diverse trees growing in a common environment like the Arboretum, she can identify functional traits that are important for success outside their historical conditions.
Lorna Gibson
Professor, MIT
Associate, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
The research of Lorna Gibson is focused on the mechanics of materials with a cellular structure such as engineering honeycombs and foams, natural materials such as wood, leaves and bamboo and medical materials such as trabecular bone and tissue engineering scaffolds.
Lucy Hutyra
Associate Professor, Boston University
Associate, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Lucy Hutyra focuses on understanding the carbon cycle in an urban environment with research sites across Boston including the Arnold Arboretum. Lucy and Pam Templer collaborate with the Arnold Arboretum to set-up, operate, and analyze the data gathered from the Arboretum’s National Atmospheric Deposition Program Site (NADP site) at Weld Hill.
Jianhua Li
Associate Professor, Hope College
Associate, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Jianhua Li is a former Arnold Arboretum senior scientist and a Sargent Award Recipient. Jianhua focuses on the reconstruction of the early tree of life of Acer. The evolutionary relationships of this important and diverse tree genus has, thus far, remained largely unresolved hindering our understanding of the natural history of maples.
Morgan Moeglein
Assistant Professor, Norwich University
Putnam Fellow and Visiting Scholar, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Overwintering of leaf buds is a common strategy thought to allow plants to adapt to periodically stressful environments. Morgan Moeglein is developing a comparative framework for understanding fundamental questions of the timing and mechanisms of leaf preformation in buds, its contribution to seasonal growth, and the conservation of these strategies using closely related species in the Arboretum’s living collections.
Dan Sullivan
Sargent Award Recipient
Associate, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
I’m a retired molecular biologist, having spent most of the time since my PhD working for various biotech companies, including 10+ years at MJ Research making the best ever thermal cyclers. At the Arboretum, I’m getting back to my roots (B.S. Botany, 1966) by evaluating a number of things to facilitate molecular studies of the Arboretum’s collections. The major part of my work involves the establishment of an on-going collection of dried newly emerging leaves, which are an excellent year-round source of DNA, from the Arboretum’s highly curated accessions. I’m also preparing protocols for the efficient extraction of DNA from the DEL tissue.
As of 2022, this Dried Emerging Leaf (DEL) collection includes at least one example of about 30% of all assessed species in the Arboretum, and has been integrated into the Arboretum’s collections management system, BGBASE.
Jacob Suissa
NSF Fellow, Cornell University
Visiting Fellow, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
Jacob Suissa is an evolutionary biologist focusing on Ferns and Lycophytes. He takes a broad scale macroevolutionary approach as well as a small scale physiological approach to answer interesting questions about fern evolution. He is currently an NSF postdoctoral fellow at Cornell University.
Pam Templer
Professor, Boston University
Associate, Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University
The work of Pamela Templer involves examining the effects of climate change and urbanization on forest ecosystems including numerous sites at the Arboretum. In addition, Pam and Lucy Hutyra collaborate with the Arnold Arboretum to set-up, operate, and analyze the data gathered from the Arboretum’s National Atmospheric Deposition Program Site (NADP site) at Weld Hill.
Elizabeth Wolkovich
Associate Professor, University of British Columbia, Canada
Visiting Scholar, OEB, Harvard University
Elizabeth Wolkovich is interested in how communities assemble and disassemble in light of global changes. The Wolkovich lab focuses on testing and understanding underlying mechanisms using both theoretical techniques and field experiments to study how current and future plant communities are shaped.
Arboretum Scientists | Visiting Scientists | DaRin Butz Interns | Research Interns | Putnam Fellows | Arboretum Award Recipients | Alumni | Research Publications
Research Interns and Trainees
Our research interns and trainees, primarily undergraduate students and recent graduates, gain valuable experience working in a research environment while working closely under the direction of our research scientists, including the Friedman lab, Hopkins lab, Taylor lab and Putnam Fellows. Our DaRin Butz Interns conduct research for 10 weeks in the summer as part of the DaRin Butz Foundation Research Internship Program at the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University.
- Hannah Adler, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Taylor Lab
- Spencer Carter, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Hopkins Lab
- Nick Daley, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Taylor Lab
- Isabel Eddy, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Taylor Lab
- Joseph Fadule, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Taylor Lab
- Jake Greer, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Hopkins Lab
- Andrew Ford, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Hopkins Lab
- Sabrina Freidus, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Hopkins Lab
- Kim Hartung, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Taylor Lab
- Peyton Jones, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Hopkins Lab
- Dorina Kodeanu, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Hopkins Lab
- Catherine Mailly, undergraduate student, Harvard College, Hopkins Lab