Congratulations SICB 2024 BSP Winners!

Division of Animal Behavior Marlene Zuk Award for best talk: Maria Salazar Nicholls Neural control of hatching enzyme release enables rapid escape-hatching in red-eyed treefrogs ‘I am an Ecuadorian PhD student in the Warkentin Lab at Boston University. My research focuses on understanding the mechanisms that underlie adaptive behaviors in early life stages. Specifically, I […]

President’s Challenge: Support the Mangum Fund

Did you attend SICB as a student, or have you brought your own students to SICB?  Did the opportunity to network with more senior scientists at SICB impact your career? SICB takes pride in its status as one of the most student-friendly scientific conferences – it’s a place where students stand shoulder to shoulder with […]

SICB Awarded Funding for Major Cultural Change Initiative

1/4/24  The Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology (SICB) has been awarded funding from the National Science Foundation BIO-LEAPS (Leading Culture Change through Professional Societies of Biology) Program. The proposal, entitled “Strengthening Inclusion by Change in Building Equity, Diversity and Understanding (SICBEDU)” will address how SICB can better educate, train, and serve its members by […]

100 feet. No brain. Still walking.

My brain works to control only two feet, and I still manage to trip on a regular basis. Sea stars on the other hand, have hundreds of tube feet and no brain, but somehow keep walking. In fact, sea stars are capable of a speedy bouncing gait characterized by vertically oscillatory motion relative to the […]

Ripe with possibility: the queer language of plants

Using accurate language is important: the words we choose influence how people think. For example, saying someone is childlike could be taken as a compliment, but saying something is childish is decidedly an insult. This applies to how we frame science as well, particularly when talking to the general public. If you describe a creature […]

Tadpoles Without Friends: Bigger, Badder, Meaner

Don’t let these cheerful bright colors fool you – not only is this frog poisonous, but it is also harboring a tiny cannibal on its back. These flashy frogs are not only poisonous as adults, but are even dangerous when freshly hatched from their eggs (dangerous, that is, if you are another tadpole). Tadpoles of […]

High on sugar! Iguanas love sugary treats..…maybe a bit too much

The rock iguanas in the Bahamas are delighted when they hear the sound of the speedboats filled with grape-laden tourists landing on the beaches. An essential part of the tourist experience is to feed the iguanas, so these endangered reptiles that once ran away from humans are now running towards them to gobble up the […]

SICB speaks out on DEIJ in higher education

The Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology (SICB) is deeply and firmly committed to Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice (DEIJ) as the foundation of sound science and science education. SICB unequivocally condemns recent steps taken by the state of Florida, or any state, that would threaten the integrity of science by weakening DEIJ initiatives and […]

the Society for
Integrative &
Comparative
Biology