A dilemma
Escaping or resisting disease: the dilemma of a tropical tree
September 28, 2023
How does a tree escape or resist disease?
How does a tree escape or resist disease?
A groundbreaking study assessed the extinction risk of more than 8,000 amphibian species worldwide and concluded that two out of five amphibians are threatened.
Research in our lab integrates disease ecology, mycology, and community ecology. We explore the nature and outcomes of plant-microbe interactions, as well as the ecology and epidemiology of fungal pathogens of tropical trees, using a combination of surveys and experiments in the forest,...
Our lab supports research into the lived experience of ancient Isthmian cultures and human groups of the American Tropics more broadly. We explore a wide variety of research questions using multiple, often interdisciplinary approaches that include the study of diverse archaeological material...
Students in Bocas del Toro helped Smithsonian researchers collect environmental data to better understand what factors influence the proliferation of algal deposits in the largest island of the archipelago
A species of tree fern found only in Panama uses ‘zombie leaves’ or reanimated dead leaf fronds, and turns them into root structures that feed the mother plant.
What started as a student summer job, became Anibal Velarde’s life’s work. Over fifty years later, he is still at the Smithsonian
Irene Kopelman’s most recent exhibit, which includes a new collaboration with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, can be seen at Panama’s Museum of Contemporary Art.
Over the last two years, staff at the Ukrainian Bat Rehabilitation Center have worked to save bats from the dangers of the Russian full-scale invasion. Now, they join researchers at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute to study bat behavior in Panama.
Virola trees in Panama are defying a well-known hypothesis from the 1970s regarding tropical biodiversity, revealing how genetics and the environment shape pathogen communities and seedling survival in tropical forests