Month: November 2025

Featured image photo credit: The Entomological Society of America

Members of the INHS Medical Entomology Lab attended the Entomological Society of America Annual Meeting in Portland, Oregon (November 9–12, 2025), where they showcased a wide range of research in vector biology, mosquito ecology, and pathogen transmission. We are proud to share the many contributions our team made during this year’s conference—and to celebrate an award-winning presentation from one of our students.

Student Award Recognition

Joseph Spina, a graduate student in our lab, won First Place in the Graduate 10-Minute Paper Competition: MUVE, General for his presentation on the epidemic potential of Ross River virus. Congratulations, Joseph, on this outstanding achievement!

Symposia and Presentations

Chris Stone and Gabriel Yan co-organized and hosted a symposium on environmental impacts on mosquito biology and vector-borne pathogen transmission. Kylee Noel, Arif Ciloglu, and Raymond Kim each delivered oral presentations on their current research, ranging from insecticide and heat influences on West Nile virus risk to phylogenomics of tick divergence and environmental determinants of mosquito microbiota. Noah Seo presented a poster on the genomic diversity of Jamestown Canyon virus in mosquitoes from northeastern Illinois.

We are proud of the impactful science our group brought to ESA this year and extend special congratulations to Joseph for his first-place win!

Dr. Arif Ciloglu delivered two seminars highlighting current research on avian vector-borne parasites and their ecological significance.

The first seminar, titled “Tiny Hitchhikers, Big Impacts: Following Vector-Borne Parasites on the Wings of Birds,” was presented at the Illinois Natural History Survey (INHS) on September 30, 2025. A second talk, “A Bird’s-Eye View of Avian Haemosporidian Parasites: Detection, Ecology, and Evolution,” was given at the Harold W. Manter Laboratory of Parasitology, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, on October 9, 2025.

Both seminars provided valuable insights into the detection, ecology, and evolution of avian haemosporidian parasites and their vectors.

We congratulate Dr. Ciloglu for his successful presentations.