Warm welcome to RJ Millena, pictured with some team wasp members!
Despite all challenges, I'm feeling so grateful for my team & their amazing research progress.
Also, thrilled that Dr. RJ Millena @entomolrj.bsky.social has joined #teamwasp as our inaugural departmental postdoc fellow! #wasplove #strepsipteralove
Our podcast is out! Check out our research @urochester.bsky.social that is decoding how true biohackers called twisted-winged insects control social wasps! #teamwasp #strepsiptera #zombiewasps 🐝🧟♀️ Please check out this fantastic initiative by @bugsneedheroes.bsky.social. Thank you for having me!
The name is deceptive because only the males have wings and they only have hours to use them to turn wasps into zombies! These rare insects have a strange life history as parasitoids. Keep an eye out around goldenrod flowers and you might see an infected wasp! If you do tag #TeamWasp on your socials
#TeamWasp
Let's get it over with already.
Wasp colony with a picture of Alicent Hightower.
Wasp colony with a picture of King Geoffrey
Wasp colony with a picture of Ramsay Bolton
I’m back from a work trip and it’s my turn to do colony check-ins. I asked for which colonies to 👀 for potentially killing brood… and I get this protocol 🤣🤣 #teamwasp #ProudPI
Team wasp PI holding a Polistes fuscatus
Team wasp in our wasp rearing room with experimental colonies
Team wasps in the field!
Team wasp collecting in the field
After >20 years of working with wasps, I like them even more now!
And a ⭐️ team that’s rocking this season and experimental infections with twisted wing parasites! #wasplove #strepsiptera #fieldseason #ProudPI #teamwasp
A black and pale yellow wasp on what looks like someone's deck. It's also a bit of a chonk, which I love.
And the bald-faced wasp looks like a chanel suit come to life! #TeamWasp
A mud dauber wasp, which is iridescent blue-green, hanging out on a log.
How about the mud dauber wasp? Look at that blue! #TeamWasp
A cuckoo wasp - it's a deep and iridescent green, curved forward with it's translucent black wings behind.
The cuckoo wasp looks like a little geme. It looks like a carved emerald! #TeamWasp
When someone with an enormous platform on here (not gonna name names) says "are wasps evil? science says yes", well, fuck that guy. Wasps aren't evil. They are amazing engineers and important pollinators and damn beautiful. #TeamWasp
#teamwasp celebrates graduating seniors
Graduation party @tropbiolab 2025
🌟 Graduation party for our three undergrad stars from #teamwasp @tropbiolab.bsky.social ! 🌟
Grateful for mentoring an amazing team of rising scholars.
The party included some 🦅🐝🐜 watching... & the most unesthetic piñata, decorated with early figures from our graduates!
#proudPI
Three Polistes dominula wasps in their newly built nest, showing their abdomen and some eggs inside the cells.
Tis’ the season that generous naturalists start to send me wasp pictures! This “booty” pic 🤣 shows the foundresses of Polistes dominula, native to Europe. It’s invasive here and in many other places in the world.
#teamwasp #teamxenome @tropbiolab.bsky.social is ready, experiment time! #wasplove
Congratulations Natasha - go #TeamWasp!! 🐝
Student with a wasp shirt while holding a wasp
🌟Congrats to undergrad researcher Natasha Vacca @nvacca08.bsky.social for being awarded the NSF-GRFP! 🌟
We're also thrilled that Natasha is not tired of us and will continue as a doctoral student with #teamwasp @tropbiolab.bsky.social @urochester.bsky.social
#wasplove #addictedtostrepsiptera
Team wasp from Trop Bio Lab in Biology at the University of Rochester posing with our mascot, Rocky the yellowjacket.
#teamwasp 2024, including our mascot Rocky the yellowjacket @urochester.bsky.social! #ProudPI
Wrapping up my first year as a TT professor! Mil gracias (a thousand thanks) to everyone who has supported me. Those of us from non-traditional trajectories and minoritized backgrounds belong in academia!
Trop Bio Lab Holiday gathering. Ugly sweater theme.
Trop Bio Lab’s team wasp takes a holiday picture
Trop Bio Lab’s team bird takes a holiday picture
Holiday and farewell party for Trop Bio Lab
Happy holidays from @tropbiolab.bsky.social! We enjoyed our ugly sweater-themed
farewell party for wonderful Elsie and Ferro.
Grateful for #teamwasp and #teambird!
Team wasp at University of Rochester
I get to work with this amazing group of scientists every day! Missing @nvacca08.bsky.social in this pic so we’ll update soon. #teamwasp #teamstrepsiptera
¡Tengo la suerte de trabajar con este grupo increíble de científicos a diario!
¡Hola! Excited to see old and new friends from the scientific community here. I'm an Assistant Professor who studies social evolution & mechanisms underlying parasite-induced manipulation in social wasps. We'll share updates from #teamwasp #strepsiptera here and @tropbiolab.bsky.social
I've never been stung, used to get them to sit on my hand so I could have a closer look. They're beautiful! 😍 #TeamWasp
