News Release

Entomological Society of America recognizes 2014 Fellows

The Entomological Society of America has elected 10 entomologists as Fellows of the Society for 2014

Grant and Award Announcement

Entomological Society of America

The Governing Board of the Entomological Society of America (ESA) has elected ten new Fellows of the Society for 2014. The election as a Fellow acknowledges outstanding contributions to entomology in one or more of the following: research, teaching, extension, or administration. The following Fellows will be recognized during Entomology 2014 -- ESA's 62nd Annual Meeting -- which will be held November 16-19, 2014 in Portland, Oregon.

DR. NILSA A. BOSQUE-PÉREZ is a professor with the Department of Plant, Soil and Entomological Sciences at the University of Idaho (UI). She is internationally known for her research on insect-host plant interactions, insect vectors of plant viruses, and host plant resistance to insects and pathogens. She is additionally recognized for her distinguished contributions to interdisciplinary graduate education.

Bosque-Pérez was born in San Sebastián, Puerto Rico in 1957 and spent her early years living at the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) Agricultural Experiment Station in Adjuntas, where her father served as agronomist and director. Following in her father's footsteps, she obtained a B.S. in agricultural sciences from UPR Mayagüez (1979). She then attended the University of California, Davis, where she received her M.S. (1981) and Ph.D. (1985) in entomology. In 1985, she joined the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture in Ibadan, Nigeria, where she worked for 11 years as a member of a multidisciplinary team of scientists working to increase food production, productivity, and sustainability in sub-Saharan Africa. Bosque-Pérez joined the UI faculty in 1997 and attained the rank of full professor in 2006. She served as interim dean of the UI College of Graduate Studies from 2010 to 2011.

Bosque-Pérez has contributed to fundamental discoveries in the field of host plant-virus-vector interactions, including demonstrating that transgenic virus resistance can influence vector life history and production of plant volatiles to which vectors respond. Additionally, her lab group was the first to demonstrate that plant viruses can directly alter host plant selection behavior by vectors, indicating that plant viruses can manipulate vectors to enhance their spread. These findings open new doors for the study of host plant-virus-vector interactions as well as disease and vector management. Her research group also studies the impact of management practices and landscape elements on arthropod biodiversity in temperate and tropical regions. She has published over 155 scientific papers and book chapters. A devoted student mentor, she has guided 14 graduate students as a major professor and 37 as a graduate committee member. She has served as project director and student mentor of two NSF Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) projects that created unique educational and research infrastructures to facilitate interdisciplinary team research by doctoral students.

Bosque-Pérez has been an invited speaker at conferences and scientific venues around the world, and has authored or co-authored 110 invited and more than 260 contributed presentations. She is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and her many awards include the ESA Recognition Award in Entomology (2006), the University of Idaho Award for Excellence in Interdisciplinary or Collaborative Efforts (2011), and the ESA Pacific Branch Award for Distinction in Student Mentoring (2012). She has served ESA as a member of the Journal of Medical Entomology Editorial Board (1999-2003), as a subject editor for the Journal of Economic Entomology (2010-2011), and as a member of the International Affairs Committee (2000-2002) and the Pacific Branch Executive Committee (2007-2009). She also served as guest editor of Virus Research (2011, 2013-2014). She is the proud aunt of 13 nephews and nieces and two grandnieces, and she enjoys traveling and birdwatching.

DR. GARY W. FELTON is a professor and head of the Department of Entomology at Penn State University. He is internationally recognized for his research on insect-plant interactions, and in particular for his research which focuses on the role of herbivore saliva in evading plant defenses.

Felton was born in Norfolk, VA in 1953, but soon moved to California where he grew up. He completed his B.S. in biology in 1975 at the University of California, Irvine, where he was inspired to study insect physiology by the late Howard Schneiderman. After taking several years off from his education to start a family, Felton completed his M.S. in entomology in 1983 at the University of Kentucky, where he studied under Douglas Dahlman. He then moved to the University of California, Davis, where he completed his Ph.D. in 1988 with the late Sean Duffey. He completed a short postdoctoral study with Sean, and then in 1990 he accepted the position of assistant professor in the Department of Entomology at the University of Arkansas. He attained the rank of full professor in 1998 and then accepted the position as professor and head of Entomology at Penn State University in 2000.

Felton's research focuses on mechanisms of plant defense and the adaptations that herbivorous insects use to avoid them. This research has uncovered unique ways in which insect herbivores use salivary secretions to suppress the induced responses of their host plants and has been published in journals such as Nature and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. He has published more than 100 refereed papers, including numerous review articles for book chapters and journals such as Plant Physiology, Current Opinion in Plant Biology, and Annual Plant Reviews.

Felton has been an invited speaker for numerous national and international professional meetings. He is a recipient of distinguished alumni awards from the Departments of Entomology at UC Davis and the University of Kentucky.

In his role as head of Entomology at Penn State, Felton has seen the department grow to a staff of more than 170, including 24 tenure-track faculty, more than 50 graduate students, and more than 40 additional Ph.D. level scientists. The department is known for its strengths in chemical ecology, pollinator health, vectors of infectious disease, and pest management and ecology.

Felton has served the ESA and his profession in numerous roles, including as subject editor for Environmental Entomology, Arthropod Plant Interactions, and the Archives of Insect Physiology, and Biochemistry. He has organized multiple symposia and conferences for ESA annual meetings. In addition to service as a panel member for USDA and NSF programs, he has served twice as panel manager for the USDA NRI/AFRI program. He has two children, Derek and Jessica, and is married to Dawn Luthe. He loves to travel, to sample new foods, to listen to music (blues is the best), and to experience art of all styles.

DR. MURRAY B. ISMAN is a professor of entomology and toxicology at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver. He is internationally recognized for his research on the discovery and development of botanical insecticides and antifeedants, and in the areas of insect-plant chemical interactions and insect chemical ecology.

Isman was born in Vancouver, Canada on June 14, 1953. He attended the University of British Columbia, receiving his B.S. degree in 1975 and his M.S. degree in 1977. He then went on to the University of California, Davis, earning a Ph.D. in entomology in 1981, followed by a postdoctoral position in insect toxicology at the University of California, Irvine. In 1983 he accepted a position as assistant professor in the Department of Plant Science at UBC, attaining the rank of professor in 1994. He later served as dean of the faculty of Land and Food Systems at UBC from 2005 to 2014.

Early in his career he became known for his thorough studies on neem insecticides and azadirachtin, helping to bring some clarity to a field of investigation that had been characterized by research of variable quality, dubious claims, and highly redundant work. More recently he worked with a team of investigators that provided the R&D support for EcoSMART Technologies Inc., propelling the company to become the world leader in pesticides based on plant essential oils. Along the way, Isman became an authority on the development of pesticides based on these natural products, but he has always maintained some basic research on insects, leading to some fascinating observations on insect feeding and oviposition behavior, insect memory, and the metabolism of plant toxins by insects.

Isman has published more than 180 scientific papers, reviews, and book chapters. His review of botanical insecticides, published in 2006 in the Annual Review of Entomology, has the highest citation rate of all papers published in that periodical. He has presented more than 50 invited symposium papers and 40 invited lectures covering every continent. Isman is a subject editor for the Journal of Economic Entomology and the Journal of Pest Science, and serves on three other editorial boards. In 31 years at UBC, he has supervised 22 graduate students, 13 postdoctoral fellows, and 16 visiting scientists. He was awarded the Entomological Society of Canada's Gold Medal in 2011 for outstanding achievement in Canadian entomology, having previously been awarded their C. Gordon Hewitt Award (1991) for outstanding achievement by an entomologist under the age of 40. He received the PheroTech Award of Excellence from the Professional Pest Management Association of British Columbia in 1996, and their Lifetime Achievement Award in 2014. In 2010 he delivered the Thomas and Nina Leigh Distinguished Alumni Lecture at the University of California, Davis.

He has presided over the International Society of Chemical Ecology (2002), the Phytochemical Society of North America (1993; he remains the only entomologist to have done so), and the Entomological Society of British Columbia twice (1988 and 1999). He also organized and chaired two conferences in Vancouver -- the 14th Annual Meeting of the International Society of Chemical Ecology (1997) and the Fourth World Neem Conference (1999).

Isman is married to Susie, and they have a daughter, Carly, and son, Adam. His hobbies include ice hockey (he and Adam are both goaltenders), motorsports, contemporary and native art, and fine wine.

DR. PHILLIP G. LAWYER recently retired as core staff scientist/medical entomologist at the Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases, NIAID, NIH, from which he also served the Division of Entomology at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR). He is recognized internationally for research on sand flies and associated diseases (Leishmania and Bartonella), with special emphasis on sand fly biology and vector-parasite interactions (Leishmania and Bartonella).

Dr. Lawyer was born in Wenatchee, WA, on May 10, 1945, and spent his childhood and adolescent years in Washington, Alaska, and Utah. He earned a B.S. in 1970 and an M.S. in medical entomology in 1971, both from the University of Utah, and a Ph.D. in medical entomology in 1984 from the University of Florida.

His professional experience spans over 43 years in operational and extension entomology, teaching, and research, including 30 years in the U.S. Army. He was the last military entomologist deployed to the Republic of Vietnam, where he conducted malaria control operations, plague surveillance, and supervised retrograde cargo inspections. At the U.S. Army Environmental Hygiene Agency, he conducted pest-management surveillance at military installations in 18 midwestern and northeastern states. He served two years as pest-management instructor at the Army's Academy of Health Sciences at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, TX. He was selected for an Army educational fellowship at the University of Florida to earn a Ph.D., and upon graduation was assigned to the WRAIR Department of Entomology as head of the Leishmaniasis Vector Research Section, followed by four years in Kenya researching the epidemiology of leishmaniasis in the Great Rift Valley. After returning from Kenya, assignments included: chief of the WRAIR Department of Entomology; chief, Defense Pest Management Information Analysis Center, Armed Forces Pest Management Board; entomology consultant to the Army Surgeon General; and associate professor of Medical Zoology, Division of Preventive Medicine and Biometrics, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USUHS). Upon retiring from the Army in 2001, Colonel Lawyer joined the Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases, NIAID, where he oversaw the establishment and maintenance of 17+ sand fly colonies used in leishmaniasis and bartonellosis research. His sand fly mass-rearing procedures are used in laboratories throughout the world.

Dr. Lawyer's international experience includes numerous research projects in Central and South America, the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. He has authored or co-authored more than 70 refereed publications and four book chapters. He served seven years as sand fly subject matter editor for the Journal of Medical Entomology and has organized several sand fly symposia for ESA Annual Meetings. He has served on the Scientific Program Committee for the International Symposium on Phlebotomine Sand Flies since 1991. Awards include the Bronze Star Medal (Vietnam); "A" Designator (Army equivalent of full professor); and various Outstanding Mentor awards for working with students too numerous to count but too amazing to forget. Dr. Lawyer is married with six children and 19 grandchildren. Hobbies include gardening and painting.

DR. TONG-XIAN LIU, known as "T.-X.," is a national distinguished professor of entomology at Northwest A&F University (Yangling, Shaanxi, China). He is internationally recognized for his research in biological control and tritrophic interactions of host plants, whiteflies, and aphids, and their natural enemies.

Born in Qingdao, Shandong, China in October 1955, T.-X. obtained his B.S. degree in plant protection from Shandong Agricultural University (Tai'an, Shandong, China). He enrolled at the Department of Entomology of Virginia Tech University as a graduate student in 1986 and obtained his M.S. degree in 1987. He then enrolled at the Department of Entomology of the University of Georgia and received his Ph.D. degree in 1992. He spent four years as a postdoc research associate at the University of Florida. He joined Texas AgriLife Research in 1997 as an assistant professor of entomology, working on vegetable IPM. He was promoted to associate professor in 2001 and full professor in 2005. In 2009 the Chinese government recruited and appointed him as a national distinguished professor of entomology, the most prestigious faculty position in China. Later, he was appointed as dean of the College of Plant Protection, Northwest A&F University (2010), special adviser to the president (2009), director of the Key Laboratory of Applied Entomology (2009), and director of the Key Laboratory of Crop Pest Management in the Northwest Loess Areas of the Ministry of Agriculture of China (2012).

T.-X.'s research focuses on biological control of pest insects in vegetables and field crops, insect behavior, host plant-herbivore-natural enemy tritrophic interactions, and chemical ecology. T.-X. has been a prolific author, and has published 220 refereed journal articles in various journals, including the Annual Review of Entomology, BioControl, Biological Control and various ESA journals. He has also published more than 200 educational, popular, and extension articles, and has edited four books and 18 book chapters. He has been an invited speaker by many national and international institutions around the world and at numerous professional conferences.

T.-X. has received numerous awards in various institutions and societies. In his more than 30-year career at three universities, Dr. Liu has been very active in teaching and student training. He taught general entomology, horticultural entomology, biological control, and IPM. Currently, he teaches an introductory entomology class in China. He has supervised 85 graduate students, postdoctoral research associates, and visiting scientists.

T.-X. has been an ESA member since late the 1990s, and served in several capacities, including as President of the International Branch in 2013. He has co-organized more than 20 symposia worldwide and assumed approximately 20 roles in various scientific societies worldwide. He has served as editor, associate editor, and editorial board member of more than ten journals, including Biological Control, Journal of Insect Science, Insect Science, and several others. T.-X. is married to Yong-Mei Zhang and has a son, Mike. His hobbies include Chinese calligraphy, wine, food, and travel.

DR. NANCY A. MORAN is a professor at the University of Texas. She is internationally recognized for her research on symbiosis between insects and bacteria.

Moran was born December 21, 1954 in Dallas, Texas, where she lived until beginning college at the University of Texas in Austin where she received a B.A. in the Plan II honors program in 1976. She then attended graduate school at the University of Michigan, where she obtained a Ph.D. in zoology in 1982. She was an NSF postdoctoral fellow from 1984-1986, based at Northern Arizona University. In 1986 she accepted a position as assistant professor of entomology at the University of Arizona. She remained at Arizona for 24 years, later joining the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, in which she was promoted to regents' professor. In 2010, she moved to Yale University as the William H. Fleming Professor of Biology. She started her current position at the University of Texas in August, 2013.

During her graduate and postdoctoral work, Moran studied the evolution of life cycles and host plant utilization, especially in aphids. In 1990, she began work on bacterial symbioses in aphids and other insects. She has shown that intimate symbiotic associations date to the origins of major groups of insects, millions of years in the past. She has used genomic and experimental work to show that these associations provide hosts with essential molecules and defenses. She also has made contributions involving general principles of bacterial genomics and evolution, specifically showing that strictly clonal replication of symbionts leads to loss of genes and genome reduction. Currently, she investigates heritable bacterial symbionts in sap-feeding insects and also the bacterial gut symbionts living in honey bees and bumble bees. She has published more than 200 peer-reviewed scientific papers.

Moran has been the mentor to more than 30 graduate students and postdoctoral researchers. Almost all of these are now established as independent researchers, mostly focusing on insect symbioses and insect evolution. She has sponsored more than 100 undergraduate researchers and has taught evolutionary biology to hundreds of undergraduate and graduate students. In Arizona, she established a high school research laboratory and course in which students conduct research on local insects. She has served as president of the Society for the Study of Evolution and as an editor for several journals, including Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, PLOS Biology, PLOS Genetics and Genome Biology and Evolution.

Moran has been elected to membership in the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Academy of Microbiology. At Arizona, she was elected as a Galileo Fellow, and a regents' professor, and she received the Alumni Association Extraordinary Faculty Award. In 2010, she received the International Prize for Biology from the Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science, and in 2014 the James Tiedje Award for Lifetime Contribution in Microbial Ecology.

DR. SUBBA REDDY PALLI, a professor of entomology at the University of Kentucky, is internationally recognized for his research on hormonal regulation of molting, metamorphosis and reproduction, development of ecdysone receptor-based gene switches, and RNAi-based pest management methods.

Palli was born in a small village in India and attended Andhra Pradesh Agricultural University at Bapatla, receiving a B.S. in agriculture in 1981. He attended the Indian Agricultural Research Institute and received an M.S. in 1983. Palli then moved to Canada and received his doctorate from the University of Western Ontario in 1988. He was also trained as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Washington.

Upon graduation, Palli worked as a research scientist at the Canadian Forest Service's Great Lakes Forestry Centre, and later at Rohm and Hass Company as the senior research scientist and group leader. Palli played a key role in the development of ecdysone receptor based gene switch technology that is being tested in clinical trials for regulation of anticancer genes in humans and production of bioplastics in plants. Palli joined the University of Kentucky's Department of Entomology as an assistant professor in 2002 and was promoted to associate professor and professor in 2005 and 2008, respectively.

Palli's research focuses on hormonal regulation of gene expression in insects with a goal to identify proteins that play key roles in signal transduction of ecdysteroids, juvenile hormones, and other hormones, and to use them for developing novel, environmentally-safe pest management methods. He has published 150 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters and co-edited a book. He is also a co-inventor on 28 patents. Recent research from Palli's laboratory helped to develop RNA interference technology based methods for controlling insect pests and to fight insecticide resistance in beetles and bed bugs.

Palli has received several prestigious awards at the University of Kentucky, including a University Research Professorship, Fulbright Award, the Thomas Poe Cooper Research Award, the Bobby Pass Excellence in Grantsmanship Award, the High Impact Research/Extension Award, the High Impact Paper Award, and the Wethington Award. Palli is also the recipient of the ESA Recognition Award in Insect Physiology, Biochemistry and Toxicology. He has organized and chaired several symposia at ESA Annual Meetings and at international conferences. Palli also served as President of the ESA's Physiology, Biochemistry, and Toxicology Section. He currently serves on the editorial boards of ten journals and served on grant review panels of the NSF, the USDA's National Research Initiative, and the National Institutes of Health. He also serves as the co-director of the Center for Arthropod Management Technologies, a recently established National Science Foundation Industry and University Cooperative Research Center. Palli is married to Usha Rekha and has two sons, Rohith and Roshan. His hobbies include gardening, travel, cooking, and sports.

DR. HARI C. SHARMA is a principal scientist at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), Patancheru, Telangana, India. Dr. Sharma was born in Behra, Himachal Pradesh, India, on June 15, 1954. He attended Dr. YS Parmar University of Horticulture & Forestry, where he received his B.S. degree in 1974 and M.S. degree in 1976. He joined the Ph.D. program in entomology at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), and earned his Ph.D. in 1979. He joined the Central Institute for Cotton Research in 1979 as a cotton entomologist, and six months later he accepted an entomologist position at ICRISAT, becoming a principal scientist in 1994. He has been working at ICRISAT for the past 35 years. He was also a visiting scientist at the University of Wisconsin in 1987, and the Queensland Department of Primary Industries in 1996.

Dr. Sharma's major contributions are in the areas of insect bio-ecology, host-plant resistance, transgenics and molecular markers for insect resistance, biosafety of transgenic crops to nontarget organisms, and IPM. He has published more than 250 research papers, 150 book chapters, 10 research/information bulletins, and six books. Dr. Sharma has been instrumental in developing artificial diets for insect rearing, resistance screening techniques and mechanisms, inheritance of resistance to insects, and biosafety of transgenic plants to nontarget organisms. The insect-resistant varieties identified/developed by Dr. Sharma have been released for cultivation in Asia and Africa, and/or used in crop improvement in Asia, Africa, the USA, and Australia. His contributions in developing pest-resistant cultivars and IPM systems in cotton, cereals, and grain legumes will not only help reduce the huge losses by insect pests, but will also curtail pesticide use, thus minimizing environmental pollution. His work has also demonstrated that elimination of gut microflora makes Helicoverpa resistant to Bt toxins, and that variation in gut microflora may lead to the development of insect resistance to Bt transgenic crops.

Dr. Sharma's work has been recognized by various national and international organizations, including seven Gold Medals, the Hari Om Trust Award of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, the Excellence in Science Award of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, and the International Plant Protection Award of the International Association of Plant Protection Sciences (IAPPS). He is a fellow of seven academic societies, including the Indian National Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and he is a Life Fellow of the Entomological Society of India. Dr. Sharma is a governing board Member of IAPPS, and is president of the Council of International Congresses of Entomology. Many of his graduate students have gone on to successful careers in academia, industry, and government. Dr. Sharma is married to Veena, and has two daughters, Dr. Anu Sharma (a cancer immunologist) and Ankita Sharma (an IT professional). His hobbies include gardening, walking, playing flute, and folksongs.

DR. MYRON (pronounced Meron) P. ZALUCKI, a professor at the University of Queensland (UQ), is internationally recognized for his research on basic and applied aspects of insect-plant interactions, primarily in the Lepidoptera, and particularly on monarch butterflies and pest heliothines.

Zalucki was born in Canberra on May 26, 1954, where he spent his first 22 years. He attended the Australian National University (ANU), receiving his B.S. in 1974, and completed his honors in zoology (first class) at ANU in 1976. He then entered the doctoral program in ecology at Griffith University, earning a Ph.D. in 1982. He took a short-term temporary position at UQ in 1981, and within one year he accepted a position as a lecturer (equivalent to assistant professor) in the Department of Entomology, attaining the rank of full professor in 2001 in the School of Biological Sciences.

To date, Zalucki has mentored more than 80 students that have successfully completed honors, master's, or Ph.D.s, with more in the wings. His laboratory focuses on understanding the ecology of insects using field and laboratory experiments to reveal underlying mechanisms, founded on a clear understanding of their natural histories. Over the years, this research has been published in more than 300 refereed papers, books, book chapters, and conference proceedings. Apart from fundamental aspects of oviposition behavior of adult Lepidoptera and foraging behavior of caterpillars, the work includes their migration, population dynamics, modeling distribution and abundance, and the application of this understanding to the management of some of the world's key pests, including Helicoverpa armigera and Plutella xylostella. In 1996, he was awarded the Ian MacKerras Medal by the Australian Entomological Society for outstanding contributions to entomology.

Zalucki has made significant contributions to the promotion and advancement of entomology in Australia, and internationally, through research collaboration with students and colleagues from Bangladesh, Cambodia, Canada, China, North Korea, Fiji, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Iran, Japan, Mexico, Myanmar, New Zealand, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Samoa, Singapore, Spain, the Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, Gambia, Tonga, Uganda, the USA, and Vietnam. He has served as vice president and president of the Australian Entomological Society, and chaired several conference organizing committees, including the widely acclaimed XXII International Congress of Entomology (ICE) in Brisbane. He is active on a number of editorial boards, including the Annual Review of Entomology, the Journal of Economic Entomology, Insect Science, the International Journal of Pest Management, and, until recently, the Journal of Pest Science. He is on the ICE council and was the inaugural International Branch Representative on the ESA Governing Board.

These endeavors would not be possible without the support of Jacinta, the lady that has put up with him since 1979, and four great offspring: Yaramah, Nadia, Katrusha, and Oressia. These folk, and a passion for cooking, have kept his feet on the ground.

DR. KUN YAN ZHU, a professor of entomology at Kansas State University (KSU), is internationally recognized for his research on insect molecular toxicology. Zhu was born in Zhejiang Province, China, in 1955 and attended Zhejiang Agricultural University (presently Zhejiang University), where he received his B.S. in plant protection with specialization in entomology in 1982. After he taught and conducted research in entomology at Zhejiang Agricultural University for five years, he joined Dr. William A. Brindley's laboratory at Utah State University as a graduate student in 1987. He earned his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in biology in 1989 and 1992, respectively. He then worked with Dr. John M. Clark as a postdoctoral research associate and later as a research faculty member at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst from 1992-1995. He accepted a position as assistant professor in the Department of Entomology at KSU in 1995, and was promoted to associate professor in 2002 and full professor in 2007.

Zhu's research focuses on insect resistance to chemical insecticides and Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) toxins; insect acetylcholinesterase (AChE); management of stored product pests; chitin biosynthesis, metabolism, and inhibition; and RNA interference (RNAi). His laboratory first documented the AChE paralogous gene in the greenbug, which led to the discoveries of the paralogous gene in many other insects and the mutations associated with this gene in insecticide-resistant insects by other researchers. His laboratory developed a feeding-based, double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) delivery technique by using chitosan/dsRNA nanoparticles for mosquito larvae. He has authored or co-authored 135 peer-reviewed papers and reviews, 12 book chapters, and 325 presentations (114 invited) delivered at international, national, regional, and local professional meetings. He has served as a major or co-major professor for 19 graduate students (15 graduated), and as a supervisory committee member for an additional 30 graduate students in various academic disciplines. He has hosted 27 professors, Fulbright scholars, and other visiting scholars from Brazil, China, Egypt, Germany, India, and Togo.

Zhu has served as subject editor of Journal of Economic Entomology, academic editor of PLOS ONE, associate editor of Pest Management Science, and editorial board member of eight other scientific journals, including Acta Entomologica Sinica, Archives of Insect Biochemistry and Physiology, Conference Papers in Biology, Insect Science, Journal of Integrative Agriculture, Pesticide Biochemistry and Physiology, Scientific Reports, and Psyche: A Journal of Entomology. He served as a guest editor for a special issue on insect RNA interference and for a special section on insect chitin metabolism, both published in Insect Science in 2013, and he has peer reviewed more than 330 manuscripts for approximately 60 scientific journals.

Zhu was awarded the Summer Faculty Fellowship by the National Research Council in 2004, and the C.V. Riley Achievement Award (2009) and the Recognition Award in Entomology (2011) from the ESA North Central Branch. He was elected as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2012. Zhu is married to Xiaoli Wu, and has a son, Jeffery, and daughter, Lisa.

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The Entomological Society of America is the largest organization in the world serving the professional and scientific needs of entomologists and people in related disciplines. Founded in 1889, ESA today has nearly 7,000 members affiliated with educational institutions, health agencies, private industry, and government. Members are researchers, teachers, extension service personnel, administrators, marketing representatives, research technicians, consultants, students, and hobbyists. For more information, visit http://www.entsoc.org.


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