Personnel

Ryan Ellingson, M.S. 2006

Ryan completed his M.S. thesis, "Variable development versus cryptic speciation: Phylogeography and evolutionary history of the sea slugs Alderia and Costasiella (Opisthobranchia: Sacoglossa)," in 2006. Ryan studied molecular evolution and speciation in sea slugs, combining genetic methods with field work in the Eastern Pacific and Caribbean. He is now in the Ph.D. program at UCLA's Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology.

Ryan co-authored two manuscripts to date, and was awarded a grant from the Lerner-Gray fund for marine research to support field work in the Caribbean. He collected specimens in Panama, Jamaica, and Bermuda as part of his M.S. research on population connectivity among Caribbean islands.

Ryan won awards for his research at CSULA including:

1st place, 2005 California State University Student Research Competition (Sacramento)
Best student talk, 2005 Southern California Academy of Sciences Meeting (Los Angeles)
Best Student Poster, 2005 Western Society of Naturalists meeting (Monterey, CA)
CSULA Graduate Student Alumni Association Scholarship, 2006.

He gave 5 presentations at international conferences, including:

Western Society of Naturalists 2004 (Rohnert Park, CA)
American Malacological Society 2005 (Pacific Grove, CA)
Evolution Meeting 2005 (Fairbanks, Alaska)
Western Society of Naturalists 2005 (Monterey, CA)
Larval 2006 (Oregon Institute of Marine Biology)

Current Contact -- rellingson@ucla.edu