Divisions: The Zoology Department at The Field Museum: Limnogale mergulus website

The participants in this project have worked together in various combinations over the past decade on several different projects and aim to combine their respective skills to successfully carry out the proposed study.

Dr. Link Olson completed his doctoral dissertation at the University of Chicago working on the molecular and morphological systematics of the Malagasy tenrecs, making several trips to Madagascar to conduct fieldwork. He learned DNA sequencing in the Field Museum's Pritzker Laboratory for Molecular Systematics and Evolution, where he has successfully extracted and sequenced DNA from numerous sources of degraded DNA, including scat, bone, claws, dried skin, horns, and hair from material up to 110 years old. This was followed by a two-year postdoc in the lab of Anne Yoder at Northwestern University on molecular phylogeography of Malagasy shrew tenrecs (Microgale). He is currently working as a postdoctoral researcher at the Field Museum, focusing on tree shrew systematics (using ancient DNA) and continuing with tenrec research. He will begin a new job in Fall 2003 as Curator of Mammals at the University of Alaska Museum in Fairbanks, where he will continue his phylogenetic and phylogeographic studies on Malagasy tenrecs.

Dr. Jonathan Benstead earned his Ph.D. in stream ecology at the University of Georgia. During this time he spent several extended field seasons at Madagascar's Ranomafana National Park studying the ecology of Limnogale, which included the first radio tracking study of the species ever conducted. He has extensive field experience in Madagascar and other tropical countries and is co-editor (and one of many authors) of the forthcoming Natural History of Madagascar, the most comprehensive account of Madagascar's biodiversity ever published. Jonathan currently works as a postdoctoral researcher at The Ecosystems Center, Marine Biological Laboratory, in Woods Hole, Massachussetts, where he leads a field project on Alaska's North Slope.

Ericka Ranoarivony is a graduate student at the University of Antanarivo working on the ecology of Limnogale mergulus. Ericka has obtained funding from Conservation International to conduct surveys of Limnogale along the Ranomafana-Andringitra
corridor. The expanded geographic scope proposed in this project will give Ericka additional data and field experience for her thesis.

Dr. Daniel Rakotondravony is a professor of Animal Biology and Ecology at the University of Antananarivo, where he has advised over 40 graduate students in various biological disciplines. His postdoctoral training includes participation in the Advanced Training Program on the Conservation of Biological Diversity at the Field Museum. Daniel specializes in, among other things, the taxonomy and biogeography of Madagascar's small mammals and has done fieldwork throughout much of the island.