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Author: Administrator

Upcoming talk at Travis Audubon

Upcoming talk at Travis Audubon

With the increased attention that golden-cheeked warblers are getting, with efforts to delist the species, I believe it is a great opportunity to educate and inform the lay population, as well as the very active birding community it Texas, about what the demographic recovery means and what it doesn’t. To follow up my talks in the last year with Audubon San Antonio and Texas Ornithological Society, I will be talking about this topic at Travis Audubon in May this year.  

Efforts to delist Golden-cheeked warblers in the news… again

Efforts to delist Golden-cheeked warblers in the news… again

The endangered golden-cheeked warbler is making news again.  Some groups in the state believe that the bird must be removed from the endangered species list, and hence open up land for urban development. Last time around (in 2015), the USFWS did not find sufficient evidence that the species had recovered enough to be taken off the list. The fact remains that Athrey et al showed in 2011 that the genetic diversity had declined so steeply in the past 100 years,…

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Rohit Rohra gets recognized for research

Rohit Rohra gets recognized for research

M.S. Biotechnology student Rohit Rohra (set to graduate in May 2017) was awarded the Outstanding Graduate student award following his presentation at the Biotechnology Advisory Council meeting on February 10th. His presentation was on the work he is doing in our lab, analyzing whole genome sequence data from multiple chicken breeds from around the world. His project identified specific high-impact genetic variants unique to specific chicken breeds. Congratulations Rohit!

New students and new ‘children’

New students and new ‘children’

The Athrey lab welcomed two students – Mohamed Ibrahim (started in Fall 2016) and Travis Williams  – both into the PhD program in the department of poultry science.                     We also are looking forward to a new batch of chicks from our junglefowl colony, which we have successfully expanded two full size flocks. We recently relocated our colonies to renovated, spacious pens for our birds and they certainly seem to be getting…

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Plant and Animal Genomes conference

Plant and Animal Genomes conference

I went to the PAG meeting in San Diego from the 13th- 17th. It was my first trip to this conference, and was pleasantly surprised at the diversity of topics and expertise there. I hung out with the chicken genomics community who are a very social and welcoming group, and its nice to put faces to names you see on papers.  Met some people I know from way back and also a lot of new people. The plenary talks were outstanding, and…

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Farewell to a tortured year

Farewell to a tortured year

2016 was one for the record books. A strange, contorted, misfitting year. The year that didn’t belong, and the year that nobody wanted and asked for, and no one deserved. But we got it and we lived through it. so long 2016. Let the sun forever set on the likes of you.  

Galliformes galore

Galliformes galore

I recently returned from a trip to India where I visited the Wildlife Institute of India, with whom we will be starting some work. My trip included two separate visits to national parks in India. Among the exciting things I got to see were wild Red Junglefowl which were tripping over each other at Rajaji National Park (near Dehradun), and also Gray Junglefowl at Bandipur National Park, not to mention two herds of pachyderms, dozens of peacocks!a myriad of other amazing…

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Rohit presents his work at campus mini research conference

Rohit presents his work at campus mini research conference

Congrats to Rohit on his presentation at the Biotechnology mini-research conference. This was an opportunity for him to present a poster on research he completed during the Spring 2016 semester. His poster was titled: “In silico verification of miRNAs in the chicken genome”. Nice job Rohit!