People

Prof. Michal Polak, Principal Investigator

I received my PhD in 1996 from Arizona State University with John Alcock and Therese Markow. Following a post-doc at Syracuse University with William (Tom) Starmer and Larry Wolf, I joined the faculty at UC in 1999. I owe my more formative years to Monty Wood and R.D. Lawrence. From 2009 to 2014 I served as Graduate Director in the department, was elected to the Fellows of the Graduate School in 2013, and chaired the Reappointment, Promotion and Tenure Committee in 2018/19 and the Graduate Admissions Committee since 2022. I edited a successful academic textbook, Developmental Instability: Causes and Consequences (2003, Oxford), and served a term as a North American Associate Editor for the journal Animal Behaviour (Elsevier). My hobbies include fishing (bass and walleye) and medium-scale garlic production.

Chandrima Das, Graduate Student

I'm a MS student in the lab, working in the area of nutritional genomics related to parasite resistance. I am extending the lab's previous findings of genetic polymorphisms for ectoparasite resistance in natural populations in new and exciting ways, by testing for an interaction between specific genes and host nutritional history on the expression of parasite resistance. Essentially I am testing the hypothesis of gene-by-environment interaction across a landscape of specifically chosen host metabolic genes. I received my MS degree from the University of Calcutta in 2014, with a specialization in entomology.

 

Payton Schaefer, Graduate Student

I'm pursuing my PhD research in the area of parasite-mediate sexual selection. My focal species is Drosophila albomicans which co-occurs with ectoparasitic mites in SE Asia. My research is testing the effect of parasitism in male flies on mating success and courtship performance, with an eye on discriminating direct and indirect models of sexual selection for the evolution of female mating preferences. I received my Bachelor's degree from the University of Kansas, where my undergraduate research, conducted with Dr. Jennifer Gleason, focused on courtship song and behavior in different Drosophila species.  My work in the Polak lab is allowing me to pursue my interest in animal behavior which I developed as a dual major in Biology and Psychology at KU.

 

Madelyn Palmer, Undergraduate Researcher

I'm a current senior at UC, majoring in Biological Sciences with a minor in Environmental Studies. I joined the Polak Lab in the spring of 2024, and after earning my bachelor's degree I hope to continue research in both the field and the lab. I am very interested in conservation and am currently exploring ways to integrate that passion with my interest in environmental science. In the lab, I'm investigating how energetic depletion affects host susceptibility to parasitic infection. I am also assisting graduate student Chandrima Das in identifying specific genes involved in this process using the GAL4/UAS system.

 

Joy Jones, Undergraduate Researcher

I am a first year Biological Sciences (Biomedical Studies) major here at UC, and I plan to specialize in rheumatological care and research. In the lab I'm working on morphometric analysis of field-caught flies from SE Asia. The flies are a species that forms leks in the rainforest, and I'm testing the hypothesis that larger males control preferred sites on the lek, comprising small leaves in the rainforest understory close to the Thai/Myanmar border.  I enjoy learning quantitative skills and the logic of the importance of assessing measurement error.

 

Vishva Patel, Undergraduate Researcher—Lab Alumna

Currently, I am a senior at UC studying Biological Sciences with a minor in Public Health. My goal in the lab has been to build a strong foundation in research and apply this knowledge toward a future career in healthcare as a Physician Assistant. I joined the Polak Lab in fall 2024 and conducted research over two academic semesters, working closely with graduate student Chandrima Das to test the role of specific metabolic genes in behavioral immunity. I presented my findings at UC’s Undergraduate Scholarly Showcase in April 2025, where I was so excited to receive the Excellence in Cross-Disciplinary Research Communication award. My presentation emphasized how discoveries from Drosophila research can shed light on how genes, metabolism, and nutrition may interact to influence human immunity and disease risk.

Ashley Webster, Former Graduate Student–Lab Alumna

I graduated with the MS from the Polak lab in 2024, and currently I'm a doctoral student at The University of Utah, working on ectoparasitism in avian systems. I'm fascinated with the mechanisms and evolution of resistance traits that host organisms deploy to defend themselves against naturally occurring parasites and pathogens. My MS research at UC focused on testing for the involvement of specific stress tolerance genes that may be acting pleiotropically within the genome to enhance resistance while exerting negative effects on traits in other fitness domains.

 

Dr. Karl Grieshop, Postdoctoral Fellow, Polak Lab Alumnus

I received my PhD in 2017 from Uppsala University, Sweden, under the supervision of Profs. Göran Arnqvist and David Berger. Before that, I completed my MS in the Polak Lab at the University of Cincinnati, where I also earned my BS degree. From 2018 to 2022, I was an International Postdoctoral Fellow jointly hosted by the University of Toronto and Stockholm University. My primary research interests center on sexual conflict and the evolutionary consequences of sex-specific dominance reversal for fitness. As a postdoctoral researcher at UC, I was supported by the NSF and worked with Drs. Polak and Benoit to elucidate the genetic mechanisms underlying life-history trade-offs linked to parasite resistance. I am currently a Lecturer at the University of East Anglia, UK.

 

Whitley Martin, Undergraduate Researcher—Lab Alumna

As an incoming student at the University of Cincinnati with an emphasis in neuroscience and medicine, I was drawn to the Polak Lab for its focus on animal behavior and evolution. I conducted research in the lab during the summer and fall semesters of 2024, where I trained in high-precision microscopy and morphometric analysis. My main project tested for a relationship between leg morphology and reproductive behavior among Asian Drosophila species, with a special focus on D. siamana.

 

Kaitlin Crilow, Undergraduate Researcher & Manager—Lab Alumna

I earned my B.S. in Neuroscience from UC in 2024 and worked in the Polak lab from 2021 to 2023. During the summer of 2022, I was awarded an REU fellowship and collaborated with fellow trainee Regan Phillips to study the effects of mite parasitism on mating dynamics in Drosophila albomicans, a fascinating species of fruit fly endemic to forest habitats of Southeast Asia. In addition to research, my responsibilities in the lab included routine maintenance, caring for our valuable fly stocks, supporting the lab's research objectives, and ensuring compliance with our USDA permit. In 2024, I began pursuing an M.S. in Medical Science at Indiana University, with the ultimate goal of practicing medicine.

 

Madison Closson, Undergraduate Researcher—Lab Alumna

I'm a freshman at the University of Cincinnati and I have passion for understanding how life works. Before UC I attended Fairfield High School, where I was in marching band, captain on academic team and competed on the tennis team. I'm currently training in the Polak Lab in micro-dissection and the identification of male and female reproductive anatomy in flies. My main interest is to examine the effects of ectoparasitism on male & female post-copulatory responses. My training in fly anatomy and physiology will ultimately lead to testing whether females mating with parasitized males receive fewer sperm than females mating with unparasitized males, with an eye on addressing the fascinating and more general question of the role of parasites in host post-copulatory sexual selection.

Cole Richey, Undergraduate and Polak Lab Alumnus

I'm a freshman at UC, majoring in Biology on the pre-med track. I went to high school in Indiana. My interests include running and gymnastics, and I'm on the gymnastics club team at the university. I do like sky diving, too. In my free time I also like to read, and I like a good tv show. My academic interests lie in science. In the lab at the moment, I'm learning how to trim fly wings as part of a protocol we use to measure behavioral resistance to mites. I'm very interested in the concept of pleiotropy, and my favorite thing has been to watch mites approach and parasitize flies in real time.

Sarah Shamray, Undergraduate Researcher—Lab Alumna

I'm a 3rd-year student at the University of Cincinnati, majoring in Biological Sciences. My interests in biology include zoology, ecology, and animal behavior. I've been interested in research for a while, and want to understand the consequences of how organisms, such as hosts and parasites, interact with each other depending on the environments that they experience. In the lab, I'm working with Ashley Webster to better understand why certain species of fly hosts are better suited to shed mites than other species, and which factors may be involved in mediating parasite attachment duration. After my bachelor's degree I am interested in pursuing research with field work.

Harmanpreet Singh, Undergraduate Researcher—Polak Lab Alumnus

Hi! My most memorable work in the Polak Lab involved measuring parasite resistance in our natural host–parasite systems and developing my fine motor microscopy, and high-resolution image analysis skills for careful measurement of fly eggs. I worked in the lab for four years, spanning my entire undergraduate career. During the summers of 2018 and 2019, I was supported by the NSF’s Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program — an experience that was both positive and formative. The mentorship I received and the camaraderie within the lab made a lasting impact on me. I especially valued the chance to work closely with Joy Bose. I presented my work at the Society for the Study of Evolution (SSE) meeting in 2019 in Providence, RI, and co-authored a paper in Evolution. I am now pursuing a career in health care.

Sandy Chan, Undergraduate Researcher—Lab Alumna

I have a great interest in biological research as a result of my work experience during college which also helped refine my leadership and team work skills. I graduated Sycamore High School in 2020, and by virtue of my passion for biology, I decided to pursue a major in biological sciences at UC. I started working in the Polak Lab for academic credit over spring semester 2021, and over summer of the same year I received a NSF-REU fellowship which allowed me to fully immerse myself in behavioral studies. Together with Sahithi Nagisetty, we documented the remarkable female responses to mating with parasitized male D. albomicans. I presented this work jointly with Sahithi at the annual Animal Behavior conference at Indiana University in March 2022, which was my first scientific meeting. I will be a co-author on the resulting paper. I've been accepted to medical school and I'm so excited!

Sahithi Nagisetty, Undergraduate Researcher—Alumna

I worked in the lab during my sophomore and junior years at UC, while pursuing my bachelor's degree.  I gained research experience through working on a project with Sandy Chan looking at how rates of infection by sexually transmitted mites affect female post-mating responses. I presented this work at an Animal Behavior conference in Bloomington, Indiana, and at UC's undergraduate research forum. As an undergrad, I also worked to support a migrant refugee community in Burma (Myanmar) and Thailand, and engaged with the Social Action for Women (SAW) organization in Thailand. My goals in the lab were to develop knowledge and skills in animal research, and to leverage this experience to help attain a career in medicine.

 

 

Olivia Kelleher, Polak Lab UG Researcher—Alumna

My focus in the lab was the study of parasite resistance, environmental stress (toxin exposure), and developmental instability (DI). I measured many (many!) flies and counted immeasurable numbers of sex combs with a high-resolution microscopy set up in my apartment during the Covid pandemic. It was meditative work and I enjoyed long walks with my dog, too. I'm a co-author on a paper resulting from this work, which was both memorable and rewarding as it honed my ability to focus on fine-scale work for long periods, pay attention to minute morphological detail, and aided my appreciation for data accuracy! The overarching theme of my work was the causes and consequences of DI for animal fitness outcomes. I held a STEM fellowship in the lab, and over summer 2020 I was awarded a prestigious NSF-REU fellowship.