IS: Who are you and what do you do?

NT: I’m Neil Tsutsui, Professor of Arthropod Behavior at UC Berkeley, in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management.

IS: How did you end up researching social insects?

NT: Maybe a mix of fate and luck? As a child, the first thing I ever said that I wanted to be when I grew up was an entomologist, so I might have a genetic predisposition for it. My route was circuitous, though. I majored in Marine Biology as an undergrad, then started off in graduate school as a cell biologist, studying the Golgi apparatus. After deciding that I wanted to spend my career studying organisms rather than organelles, I jumped over to the lab of an evolutionary ecologist (Ted Case). There, I started working on a project using microsatellites to quantify gene flow across a hybrid zone of whiptail lizards. Andy Suarez was a graduate student in the same lab, and he was studying the impact of invasive Argentine ants on native ants and horned lizards. David Holway joined as a post-doc soon afterward. Since we were always chatting about Argentine ants, and they had colonies in the lab, it seemed like a good idea for me to do something with them, as well. Once I started seeing the genetic data from Californian populations of Argentine ants, it was obvious that something interesting was going on – they had very, very little genetic variation across long distances. Quite opposite to what I was seeing in my lizard data. I started spending more and more time on the Argentine ant project, and have continued with them ever since. I never finished the lizard project.

IS: What is your favourite social insect and why?

NT: Argentine ants have been like Karl von Frisch’s “magic well” for me, so I have great fondness for them. I’m becoming increasingly fascinated with Polyergus, though.

IS: What is the best moment/discovery in your research so far? What made it so memorable?

NT: Hard to say. Seeing the first population genetic data from native and introduced Argentine ants is up there: I was pretty surprised by the extreme differences in genetic diversity and spatial genetic structure. Later, our experimental confirmation of colony recognition cues was also fun – it was amazing to see Argentine ant nestmates attack each other when we altered their colony odors with synthetic hydrocarbons.

IS: If teaching is part of your work, what courses do you teach? Has your work on social insects helped to shape your teaching?

NT: I mainly teach Insect Behavior and senior seminars for undergraduates, plus the occasional graduate seminar on chemical ecology or other specialized topics. Social insect examples are very prominently on display throughout my Insect Behavior course.

IS: What is the last book you read? Would you recommend it? Why or why not?

NT: Just finished “The Left Hand of Darkness,” by Ursula Le Guin. Yes, recommended – a nice short read, but quite interesting.

IS: Did any one book have a major influence in shaping your career? What was the book and how did it affect you?

NT: I don’t think that there was a single book, but a cumulative influence of National Geographic and Natural History magazines when younger, books by Stephen Jay Gould and Richard Dawkins in high school, and, of course, E.O. Wilson later.

IS: Outside of science, what are your favourite activities, hobbies or sports?

NT: Lots of different things, but none of them with any high level of proficiency: urban farming, birding, saltwater aquarium-keeping, parenting.

IS: How do you keep going when things get tough?

NT: Well, things are often tough in academia. Eventually you accept that sometimes you’ll be in over your head, it’ll just be too much, and you’ll fail. Reviews won’t get done, you’ll miss meetings, classes will go badly, etc. Over time, I’ve learned to say “no” to avoid having commitments pile up, and I’ve grown accustomed to just grinding through the tough patches and not letting the failures upset me too much.

IS: If you were on an island and could only bring three things, what would you bring? Why?

NT: You mean that I’m stuck on the island forever? Then it’s gotta be something along the lines of solar still, fishing gear, and magnesium-flint firestarter.

IS: Who do you think has had the greatest influence on your science career?

NT: Probably my colleagues Andy Suarez and David Holway. Let’s get together for a reunion tour, guys!

IS: What advice would you give to a young person hoping to be a social insect researcher in the future?

NT: Well, there are lots of different ways of doing science, so the same formula won’t work for everyone. But I’d say one thing is to make sure that you’re always learning about things outside of your main field of interest. Even if you end up becoming a hyper-specialist in your own research, you’ll benefit from viewing the world through a broader lens.

 

IS: Who are you and what do you do?

AW: I am Alex Wild, Curator of Entomology at The University of Texas at Austin. I also run a small insect photography business. I suppose most people know me for the photos.

IS: How did you end up researching social insects?

AW: I wish I had a logical answer for why I’m so taken by social insects. But I don’t. I started early in life, so early that the infatuation seems to have been an inchoate, primordial fixation from a mis-wiring of my brain stem. I was collecting carpenter ants at five, for example, and many of my early childhood drawings depict crude tunnels of ant nests. I didn’t- and still don’t- know why I like social insects, though I can come up with all manner of post-hoc rationalizations.

True story. At age 8 an older cousin I did not know well inquired about my interests, as way of introductory small talk. I think she was expecting some standard answer like “Hockey” or “Video Games” or “Ice Cream” or whatever the kids liked those days. I announced, instead, “I like colony insects!”.

In college (Bowdoin), my ecology professor Nat Wheelwright explained me that one could actually have a career studying ants. I had no idea! Nat started me down a path that eventually led to taxonomy.

IS: What is your favourite social insect and why?

AW: Turtle ants! Or maybe paper wasps? Hard to say. I love Iridomyrmex, in Australia, quietly running the continent while everyone else is distracted by the giant bull ants.

IS: What is the best moment/discovery in your research so far? What made it so memorable?

AW: I discovered a new genus of ant on Google once, in the early days of the internet. I didn’t do anything with it at the time. A year later, I stopped to watch the sunset in the middle of the Paraguayan Chaco and accidentally happened across a living colony of the same mystery ant. That was exciting- I recognized it right away. I worked with Fabiana Cuezzo to describe it formally as Gracilidris.

IS: If teaching is part of your work, what courses do you teach? Has your work on social insects helped to shape your teaching?

 AW: I teach Introductory Entomology at UT-Austin. It’s a challenging environment for a bug guy, as UT has no Entomology Department, so my little course is the only entomology most students get and few students have an entomological background. Of course, we use a lot of social insect examples in the lectures and labs.

I taught beekeeping at the University of Illinois for a couple years. It was a tremendous class. Universities would do well to invest more in small courses that combine hands-on activities with general biological theory. We covered both honey extraction and the debates over kin selection.

Mostly, though, I teach photography. Social insects occupy a special place for the insect photographer. Normally, the aesthetic challenge is to make alien-looking species appear relatable to the naïve human audience. Social insects anthropomorphize themselves. It’s much easier to take a compelling photograph of an ant- a photograph that non-biologists can relate to- than of a non-social beetle or fly.

IS: What is the last book you read? Would you recommend it? Why or why not?

AW: “Lab Girl” by Hope Jahren. Recommend!

IS: Did any one book have a major influence in shaping your career? What was the book and how did it affect you?

AW: I often return to the concepts in Maynard Smith & Szathmary’s “Major Transitions in Evolution.”

IS: Outside of science, what are your favourite activities, hobbies or sports?

AW: I kind of have my hobby for job. So I alternate between sleep, kid care, and hobby.

IS: How do you keep going when things get tough?

AW: I find point-mounting therapeutic. Doesn’t everyone? But, emotionally, I rely a great deal on my wife and two young children. Having kids has rather mellowed my outlook.

IS: If you were on an island and could only bring three things, what would you bring? Why?

AW: Islands can be pretty depauperate. I’m more of a lowland forest guy. Am I allowed a boat with oars?

IS: Who do you think has had the greatest influence on your science career?

AW: My scientific instincts are moulded on those of my Ph.D. advisor, Phil Ward. But I’d be lying if I didn’t say I am most influenced by my parents, neither of whom are scientists themselves but they knew how to play the long game by encouraging an inquisitive, social-insect obsessed young mind.

IS: What advice would you give to a young person hoping to be a social insect researcher in the future?

AW: Normally I’d advise not worrying too much about the particulars of how one enters science- there are many paths to get where you’d like to go, as well as many destinations you may not have thought of. At least, that’s how it’s been in recent decades.

But today? We live in a perilous time, and retreating inward to the lab is capitulation. I advise connecting with local universities, museums, non-profits, and other science organizations to engage aggressively in outreach. You’ll make connections that may prove valuable later in your career, and you’ll help ensure that basic science survives the current mess.