Ongoing Research Projects:
I. Systematics and Taxonomy of North American Polygyrid Land Snails
II. Population genetics and ecology
III. Conservation Biology

One ongoing population genetics and ecological research project is the study of freshwater snails in Texas springs. These projects were carried out in collaboration with a colleague and graduate students at University of Louisiana-Monroe. Elimia is a large and widely distributed genus of freshwater snails in eastern North America. One species, E. comalensis is native to springs in the Edwards Plateau region of Texas. This research  explored the distribution, morphological variation, and molecular systematics of E. comalensis using geometric morphometrics and mitochondrial DNA sequences. We initially believed that E. comalensis was comprised of multiple unrecognized species with each species occupying springs in single drainage basins. This research instead revealed that E. comalensis was genetically uniform across isolated spring systems and appears to be a recent introduction, a native exotic species to the springs in the western part of its distribution. This poses a conservation and management conundrum. E. comalensis remains a species that is limited in distribution to highly human impacted springs. However, in some of those springs, which themselves contain endangered species, E. comalensis appears to be non-native, and is having undetermined impacts on the native flora and fauna. I am continuing research on this snail by examining the life history of this group and looking more closely at population genetics of this species and its interaction with other invasive freshwater snails.