Announcement
The goal of this NSF funded program is to provide undergraduate students with experience in hypothesis-driven collaborative research utilizing field based and/or laboratory methods every summer and fully engage them in projects associated with the ecology and evolution influencing Chihuahuan Desert biodiversity.
In their application, students will have the opportunity to select from more than 10 faculty driven projects/topics, each focusing on a biological discipline related to Chihuahuan Desert biodiversity. Students will receive meaningful exposure to research methodology as described in each of the project summaries from the faculty participants below:
- Anthony Darrouzet-Nardi
- Soil biogeochemistry, global change, drylands, belowground ecology, biological soil crusts
- Elizabeth LaRue
- Ecosystem Science, Remote Sensing, Plant Species Distributions and Structural Diversity of Ecosystems
- Philip Lavretsky
- Filling important knowledge gaps in the ecology of the Mexican duck
- Vanessa L. Lougheed
- Approaches to improve understanding of the causes and consequences of ecosystem change, degradation and restoration
- Alejandra Martinez Blancas
- Seed dispersal, restoration, grassland conservation, shrub encroachment
- Michael L. Moody
- Botany, Plant Evolutionary Genetics, Molecular Ecology
- Ben Padilla
- Wildlife distribution & dynamics, natural & anthropogenic environments
- Kelly S. Ramirez
- Environmental microbiomes, climate change, host-microbe interactions, global change, restoration
- Brett Seymoure
- Animal behavior, sensory ecology, light pollution, predator-prey, entomology
- Elizabeth J. Walsh
- Evolution and ecology of freshwater invertebrates
The program will provide a cohort of summer participants with a high quality experience that combines education and novel research projects utilizing the 40,000 acre Indio Mountain Research Station and surrounding Chihuahuan Desert sites as well as the state-of-the-art facilities at UTEP. Participants will also receive training in bioethics, one-on-one and group mentoring, and training in other relevant professional skills (e.g. oral presentations and applying to graduate school).
Each participant will be guided directly by different members of the CDB faculty team, but they will participate in a number of activities that will keep them as a cooperative summer cohort that shares research interests in biodiversity studies and thus will benefit by understanding each other's work and contributing to each other’s growth as practicing scientists.
The major emphasis of this program is developing skills for performing independent and collaborative research. Participants will be integrated into the research groups of individual faculty mentors. However, given that the program has a unifying theme, participants will be sharing common research interests as well as goals for academic and professional development. Consequently, participants will meet as a group for discussions, training, formal presentations, workshops and seminars. At the end of the program, students will present the results of their summer’s efforts at a UTEP-wide science symposium.
Important Dates & Info
Deadline for application: March 1, 2026
Program Duration: 10 weeks
Start Date: May 27, 2026
End Date: August 1, 2026
Note: Students are expected to arrive in El Paso on Tuesday, May 26 and depart on Sunday, August 2.
Undergraduate Students admitted to the program will receive:
- $7,000 for 10 weeks
- Housing in shared apartments for non-local students
- Travel reimbursement to/from El Paso of up to $700
- $140 weekly food per diem
Funding Acknowledgement
This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant Number DBI-1950810.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
