2023-03-13 - DR. JAMES NARDI says you can tell a lot about a tree by the company it keeps. From life in the soil around their roots to the action up in their canopies, trees are swarming with engagement—unseen microbes and fungi, countless insects and other arthropods, and vertebrates like birds, squirrels, and even porcupines.   Jim Nardi spoke about their diverse community of companions. He is...

2023-03-01 - We are pleased to announce that the winner of the Insects 2022 Young Investigator Award is Dr. Adam G. Dolezal, Assistant Professor in the Department of Entomology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, United States.

2023-02-27 - The Insect Fear Film Festival celebrates 40 years of entertaining and educating people about insects and their close relatives at this year’s March 4 event at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. It will be the first in-person festival since 2020. Living Fossils.

2022-11-07 - Honey bee workers collect pollen and nectar from a variety of flowering plants to use as a food source. Honey bees typically forage from up to 1-2 miles away from the hive, though sometimes they travel even further, including up to 10 miles away. However, much of the modern landscape consists of agricultural fields, which limits the foraging options for honey bees in these areas.

2021-10-20 - From pesticide detox to increased longevity, the benefits of the sweet stuff go well beyond simply nourishing the hardworking insects in the hive. May Berenabaum answers questions for Knowable Magazine about honey and its health benefits.

2021-10-20 - Wildflowers peek their heads through the grass. An eastern tailed-blue butterfly flits among the tall, swaying blades as a red-winged blackbird flies overhead. When Fred Delcomyn looks outside, this is what he might see. In 2001, when he and his wife, Nancy, moved to their home outside of Urbana, Illinois, it looked a lot different.

2021-10-12 - This edition of Beckman's Grad Student Visionaries series features Elizabeth Bello, a graduate student studying entomology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. She takes advantage of Beckman’s Microscopy Suite to further her research in the Alleyne Bioinspiration Co-...

2021-08-24 - It’s a sweltering summer afternoon. I’m pushing aside tree limbs and crunching leaves to get back to the trap that I baited two hours ago with dry ice to attract ticks. When I get closer, I can see a gossamer mist hovering over a bright white cloth in the dark underbrush. Dry ice “sublimates” in the open air, going from a solid to a gaseous state. It gives off a vapor of carbon dioxide gas that’s...

2021-06-08 - Pollinator habitats and solar farms may seem like ecologically great neighbors, but we still don't understand very much about that relationship. A team of researchers recently published a paper surveying the ins and outs of keeping solar production alongside the kinds of plants that pollinators like bees and butterflies love. The paper notes that...

2021-06-02 - Scott Clem, Ph.D., recently completed his doctoral degree at the University of Illinois. Part of his research focused on evaluating the value of semi-natural field borders as winter refuge for beneficial arthropods that like to eat or parasitize crop pests.

2021-05-28 - Research images from a recent contest are the latest to be framed and displayed in the Beckman Institute Director’s conference room. The images showcase the range of research conducted at the institute. Among the winners -- undergraduate student Shreyas Rajagopalan, a member of the Alleyne Bioinspiration Col-LAB-orative.

2021-05-27 - After lying dormant for 17 years, billions of Cicadas – big insects with big wings are awakening in far eastern Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and other states. Illinois Newsroom’s Reginald Hardwick talked with Katie Dana (Entomology graduate student), the scientific specialist in entomology at the Illinois Natural Science Survey. She says this year’s insect invasion is just a warmup for 2024.

2021-04-28 - The program offers University of Illinois graduate students at the M.A., M.S., or Ph.D. level the opportunity to pursue interdisciplinary research at the institute. Elizabeth (Department of Entomology) is pursuing an M.S. in entomology and will work with Marianne Alleyne of entomology and Charles Schroeder of materials science and engineering and chemical and biomolecular engineering. She will...

2021-04-27 - Written by Elizabeth Bello, Department of Entomology graduate student With many of us feeling the negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and self-isolation, some more than others, one thing is for certain: We all previously underestimated the importance of our social circles. Something as simple as going out for coffee with a friend or stopping in the hallway to catch up with someone...

2021-04-20 - Cariad Williams joined the Prairie Research Institute Center for Paleontology as a graduate student in August 2019. She's pursuing a PhD in the entomology at the University of Illinois and is advised by Sam...