Research for undergraduates in theoretical ecology

Research for Undergraduates in Theoretical Ecology (RUTE) is an NSF-funded program of the Department of Mathematics, the School of Biological Sciences, and the Fisheries and Wildlife Program of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.  The principal components of this program are the RUTE Scholars program and the RUTE Summer Scholars program.  The RUTE Scholars program involves year-long research projects conducted by teams of four undergraduates, two in life science and two in mathematics, along with a faculty mentors from life sciences and mathematics.  Teams engage in a structured research program consisting of focused preparation, laboratory and/or field work, and mathematical analysis and modeling.  The first team studied the ecology of a painted turtle population in western Nebraska.  Its work has been presented at a fisheries and wildlife conference and a paper is in preparation.  The RUTE Summer Scholars program is an intensive five-week introduction to the process and methods of interdisciplinary research in theoretical ecology.  Students take a 3-credit course called Research Skills in Theoretical Ecology; this course is team-taught by a biologist and a mathematician, and centers on the theme of natural control of insect pests.  The students do laboratory studies of aphid life history and population dynamics, lady beetle life history, and predation of aphids by lady beetle larvae.  The lecture material is driven by the need to analyze the laboratory data and the goal of developing mathematical models for the population dynamics of aphids with and without lady beetles.