Joan Marsden was a remarkable woman who made important contributions to the advancement of Biology at 不良研究所. Her association with 不良研究所 spanned a full 60 years, from her undergraduate education, completed in 1943, to her job as Director of the Bellairs Institute in Barbados, a position she held at the time of her death, in Barbados, in 2001. After earning a Ph.D. at Berkeley, she returned to 不良研究所 to take up an appointment as lecturer in the Department of Zoology. She proceeded to work her way up the academic ladder, teaching comparative anatomy to legions of pre-med students and conducting research on marine invertebrates.
Shortly after the opening of the Bellairs Institute, in 1961, she and fellow zoologist John Lewis were the first 不良研究所 professors to exploit its research opportunities. She became strongly attached to the people and life style of Barbados, and travelled there almost every year for research and personal renewal. Her favorite research subject was a polychaete worm, which she studied from ecological, physiological, and neurobiological perspectives.
Joan Marsden was Chair of Zoology in 1969 when the Department of Biology was formed by fusion of the departments of Zoology, Botany, and Genetics. She was not only instrumental in creating the Biology Department, but she played a major role in shaping its future through her unfailing judgment and strong character. When she retired in 1987, her colleagues established a fund to perpetuate her memory by means of the Joan Marsden Lectures in Organismal Biology.
Her accomplishments as scientist, teacher, and administrator are especially noteworthy for having been achieved during an era when there were few women academics at 不良研究所. As a pioneer and role model, she led the way for the many women who followed and who today enrich our department. That too is part of her legacy.
Seminars in the Joan Marsden Lecture series
| Year | Speaker | Title | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-2023 | Scott V. Edwards Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology |聽Museum of Comparative Zoology,聽Harvard University |
Wings, feathers, flight: using comparative genomics to link genotype and phenotype in birds | |
| 2021-2022 | Dr. Robert Holt Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville |
COVID-19 Meets the Hutchinsonian Niche | |
| 2020-2021 | Cancelled due to Covid-19 | N/A | |
| 2019-2020 | Cancelled due to Covid-19 | N/A | |
|
2018-2019 |
Dr. Ruth Shaw Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior College of Biological Sciences, University of Minnesota |
Studying the adaptive process in the wild: purple coneflower and partridge pea | |
| 2017-2018 | Dr. Mark Q. Martindale The Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience, University of Florida |
Developmental constraints and the origin of the 鈥淐ambrian Explosion" | |
| 2016-2017 | Dr. Axel Meyer Department of Biology, University of Konstanz, Germany |
Genomics of extreme speciation and adaptation in cichlid species flocks | |
| 2015-2016 | Dr. Daniel Simberloff Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Tennessee |
Nature as profit center: The new conservation science and the devaluing of biodiversity | |
| 2015-2016 | Dr. Michael J. Ryan Department of Integrative Biology, University of Texas |
Cognitive Aspects of Mate Choice: The T煤ngara as a Case Study | |
| 2014-2015 | Dr. Armin P. Moczek Department of Biology, University of Indiana |
On the origins of novelty and diversity in development and evolution: case studies on horned beetles | |
| 2013-2014 | Dr. Russell D. Fernald Stanford University, California |
How does social information change the brain? | |
| 2012-2013 | Dr. Sarah P. Otto Department of Zoology, University of British Columbia |
The Evolutionary Enigma of Sex | |
| 2012-2013 | Dr. Michael Doebli Department of Zoology and Department of Mathematics, University of British Columbia |
Adaptive Diversification | |
| 2011-2012 | Dr. Jonathan B. Losos Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology |
Lizards in an evolutionary tree: Ecology and adaptive radiation in anoles | |
| 2010-2011 | Dr. David Tilman Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior, University of Minnesota |
Diversification, coexistence and the universal trade-off hypothesis | |