Faculty Considering Grad Students

The following faculty are considering graduate students for 2023.

We encourage applicants to contact, by email, individual faculty whose labs they are interested in, to initiate a conversation about shared interests. For suggestions on how to reach out to faculty, please see our tips for contacting potential advisors.


  • Agrawal, Anurag (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Plant-animal interactions; evolutionary and community ecology of plant-insect interactions.
  • Babonis, Leslie (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Evolutionary development (Evo-Devo), origin of novelty, invertebrate biodiversity, cnidarians, ctenophores, gene regulation, cell identity, tissue morphogenesis, regeneration, evolution of multicellularity.
  • Clark, Andrew G. (Departments of Molecular Biology and Genetics & Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Genomic basis of adaptive evolution; theoretical and statistical population genetics; genetics of complex traits.
  • Gordon, Swanne (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Polymorphism, rapid evolution, behavioral ecology, sexual selection.
  • Greischar, Megan A. (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Life history evolution, malaria, disease, transmission, epidemiology, population dynamics.
  • Hare, Matthew (Department of Natural Resources and the Environment). Population genetics, phylogeography, conservation genetics.
  • Houlton, Benjamin (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Climate Change; Agricultural and Environmental Sustainability; Biogeochemical Cycles; Global Ecology; Carbon Capture and Removal; Planetary Resilience.
  • Kessler, Andre (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Molecular and chemical ecology, plant-insect interactions, multitrophic interactions, induced plant responses to herbivory.
  • Andrés López-Sepulcre (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Eco-evolutionary dynamics, rapid evolution, life-history evolution, nutrient cycling, dispersal and invasion, ecological statistics.
  • Moeller, Andrew H., (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Evolutionary biology, genomics, microbiology, ecology.
  • Owens, Ian (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Director of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology). Bird behavior, ecology, evolution and conservation; large-scale patterns in biodiversity; evolution in wild populations; public engagement with nature and science.
  • Smith, Michelle (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Discipline-based science education research; biology education research.
  • Sparks, Jed (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Plant physiological ecology, ecosystem ecology, and biosphere-atmosphere interactions.
  • Specht, Chelsea (Section of Plant Biology). Population ecology, ecological genetics, paleobiology, population biology, systematics, physiological ecology.
  • Thaler, Jennifer (Departments of Entomology & Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Insect-plant interactions, chemical ecology, tritrophic interactions.
  • Vitousek, Maren N. (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Evolutionary physiology and behavioral ecology.
  • Xu, Xiangtao, (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). Ecological modeling/forecasting, ecological remote sensing, plant functional ecology, global change biology, terrestrial ecosystem ecology.
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