Announcements

Abstract

Next article FreeAnnouncementsFull TextPDF Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMore2005 President's AwardThe President's award of the American Society of Naturalists is given to the paper that, in the president's judgment, was the best paper to appear in the American Naturalist in the preceding calendar year. Although the selection process includes soliciting nominations from the journal's editorial board and evaluating the opinions of colleagues, the president is ultimately responsible for the selection and reads every paper published in the journal. The choice is never easy.The winner of this year's award is the article by Barney Luttbeg and Tom Langen, entitled “Comparing alternative models to empirical data: cognitive models of western scrub‐jay foraging behavior” (American Naturalist 163:263–276). In the article, the authors examine the decision rules that scrub jays use to select a nut from ensembles that vary in their distributions of nut size. This is an example of the larger phenomenon of optimal foraging and selection, whether for food items, mates, territories, or any resource for which the forager must assess variation in quality to make a sound decision.The authors assessed three types of foraging models: best of n, flexible threshold, and comparative Bayesian selection. Luttbeg and Langen began by distilling statistical attributes of an individual bird's handling pattern and then, through simulation, derived statistical distributions of these attributes. They compared these distributions to the predictions derived from each of the foraging models. Luttbeg and Langen employed both a classic hypothesis‐testing approach and a comparative model‐fitting approach to conclude that the comparative Bayesian model was the best overall explanation of scrub‐jay foraging. This result implies that the birds have the cognition to assess the quality of each item of food and change those assessments as they encounter and evaluate new items, a remarkable finding.Three features of the paper brought it to the forefront of so many excellent papers. First, the paper offered an insightful method for characterizing and analyzing foraging and handling sequences. Second, the work revealed a surprising result about the birds' cognitive ability that will change the way we think about animal foraging in the future. Third, the paper included a thoughtful discussion of the comparative strengths and weaknesses of classic hypothesis tests and a likelihood‐oriented comparison of how well various models fit the data in hand. This combination of creative approach, intriguing result, and provocative discussion earned the President's Award for 2005.2005 Edward Osborne Wilson Naturalist AwardThe Edward Osborne Wilson Naturalist Award was established in 1997 on the occasion of Professor Wilson's retirement in recognition of his lifetime of outstanding contributions in the areas of ecology and evolutionary biology, including the study of social insects, biodiversity, and biophilia. The award is given annually to an active investigator in midcareer who has made significant contributions to the knowledge of a particular ecosystem or group of organisms. Individuals whose research and writing illuminate principles of evolutionary biology and an enhanced aesthetic appreciation of natural history merit special consideration. The award consists of a $2,000 prize and an especially appropriate work of art (see fig. 1), a drawing by George Venable of Agra eowilsoni erwin, a carabid beetle species endemic to the Amazonian rain forest canopy.Figure 1: Agra eowilsoni Erwin (drawing by George Venable). Erwin, T. L. In press. Evolution at the equator: arboreal andlticolous beetles and their taxon pulses with descriptions of a new Agra subclade and its species (Coleoptera: Carabidae). In G. E. Ball, A. Casale, and A. Vigna Taglianti, editors. Phylogeny and classification of Caraboidea (Coleoptera: Adephaga). Proceedings of a Symposium (August 28, 1996, Florence, Italy), XX International Congress of Entomology. Museo Regionale Scienze Naturali‐Torino, Atti, Torino.View Large ImageDownload PowerPointThis year's award is given to Laurent Keller. Keller is known for his exploration of one of the richest themes in organismal biology, that of the interplay of conflict and cooperation in the evolution of social insects. He has spent his career at the University of Lausanne, where he is now a professor and where he has played a leadership role in recent years in building an interdisciplinary biology research community. He has worked on social Hymenoptera, mainly ants, throughout his career, thus fitting well with the profile of Wilson awardees. His work is characterized by its mix of insightful natural history observation, biological experimentation and analysis, and abundant creativity. Among his major scientific contributions are the influence of queen number on organization of ant societies, the role of phenotypic plasticity versus genotypic differences in caste differentiation, and the genetic and social bases of aging in ants. He has combined behavioral, molecular, genetic, and quantitative approaches, always grounded in the context of the natural history of his study organisms. Although space precludes any reasonable summary of his accomplishments, a sense of Keller's impressive productivity is given by a few numbers: he has published over 200 papers, including many in the most widely read scientific journals, such as Nature and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, as well as the American Naturalist and major entomological and ecological journals. His studies have had major impact on our current understanding of ant societies. His most noted contributions, which include true surprises in the world of social insect biology, originate with his keen observations of ants in nature. I also note that he has worked on a number of other arthropod groups, including bees and fig wasps, and has often collaborated with biologists from around the world.As illustrated by Keller's work, the analysis of a seemingly specialized situation arising in the context of detailed natural history observations can trigger major breakthroughs that reverberate through many areas of biology and even into other disciplines. While focusing largely on a single group, Professor Keller's work has had impact in a broad array of biological subdisciplines, reflecting his remarkable vision and capabilities for intellectual synthesis.2005 Sewall Wright AwardThe Sewall Wright Award, which recognizes a senior‐level active researcher for significant and continuing contributions to the objectives of the American Society of Naturalists, was awarded in 2005 to Robert E. Ricklefs.2005 Young Investigators' PrizesThe Young Investigators' Prizes recognize outstanding and promising work by investigators who received their doctorates in the three years preceding the application deadline or are in their final year of graduate school. Prizewinners receive reimbursement for travel to the annual meeting, where they present their work at the Young Investigators' Symposium, and a $500 honorarium. The prizes were awarded in 2005 to Daniel I. Bolnick, Alison Galvani, Jeff Townsend, and Mark Vellend.Applications for the 2006 Young Investigators' PrizesThe Young Investigators' Prizes recognize outstanding and promising work by investigators who received their doctorates in the three years preceding the application deadline or who are in their final year of graduate school. The prizes include presentation of a research paper at the annual meeting of the American Society of Naturalists, reimbursement for travel to the annual meeting, and a $500 honorarium. The prize committee requests applications for the 2006 prizes from anyone supporting the objectives of the Society. Suggested names and addresses of people who should be encouraged to apply are also welcome. Applications consist of no more than three pages (excluding tables, figures, and references) that summarize the applicant's work, no more than four appropriate reprints, a curriculum vitae, and two letters from individuals familiar with the applicant's work. Four copies of the application materials should be sent by January 31, 2006, to Prize Committee, c/o Dr. Tia‐Lynn R. Ashman, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15260 (e‐mail: [email protected]).Nominations for the 2006 Edward O. Wilson Naturalist AwardIn recognition of the lifetime of outstanding contributions of Professor E. O. Wilson in the areas of ecology and evolutionary biology, this award was established in the year of Professor Wilson's retirement from Harvard University. The E. O. Wilson Naturalist Award is given to an active investigator in midcareer who has made significant contributions to the knowledge of a particular ecosystem or group of organisms. Individuals whose research and writing illuminate principles of evolutionary biology and an enhanced aesthetic appreciation of natural history will merit special consideration. The award will consist of an especially appropriate work of art and a prize of $2,000, presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Naturalists. For the 2006 E. O. Wilson Naturalist Award, three copies of the nomination packet, each of which must include a letter of nomination, curriculum vitae including a publication list, and three key publications, should be sent by March 1, 2006, to the Award Committee, c/o Douglas W Schemske, Michigan State University, Department of Plant Biology, 166 Plant Biology Building, East Lansing, Michigan 48824‐1312 (e‐mail: [email protected]).2006 Annual Meetings of the American Society of NaturalistsThe annual meetings of the American Society of Naturalists will be held jointly with the Society for the Study of Evolution and the Society of Systematic Biologists at Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, New York, June 23–27, 2006.SynthesesIn keeping with its mission to support “the conceptual unification of the biological sciences,” the American Naturalist invites submission of a new type of article, the synthesis. Syntheses will analyze and synthesize recent findings in the biological sciences that are of interest to the readership of the journal. These articles should review recent work, but more important, these articles should present a new and synthetic perspective of those results.Before writing the synthesis, potential authors should contact the editors via the journal office with a proposal for the article, including a detailed outline and a statement of the novel goals and perspective of the article. Authors of successful proposals will be invited to submit their syntheses through the Web Peer Review system, which will then go through the same process as other submissions to the journal, with normal peer review. Syntheses should be at most the length of a normal article in the journal, and they should be accessible for a broad academic audience. Next article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The American Naturalist Volume 166, Number 6December 2005 Published for The American Society of Naturalists Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/498073 Views: 62 Crossref reports no articles citing this article.