Courses taught at FDU

Evolution
Animal Behavior
Biology Seminar
Introduction to Molecules, Genes, and Cells

Research Interests

My lab is concerned with the evolutionary dynamics of plant-insect interactions, from both the perspective of the plant and that of the herbivorous insect.  From the plant's perspective, a defense against herbivores needs to be effective against both generalist and specialist herbivores, without monopolizing a plant's resources for defense in lieu of growth or reproduction.  In particular, a defense against specialist herbivores can lead to a coevolutionary race in which a plant evolves better defenses as quickly as a specialist herbivore evolves tolerance or resistance to these defenses.  We're interested in these defensive arms races with chemical defense in plants of the family Brassicaceae, the wild mustards.  We are currently focusing on the evolutionary dynamics of chemical defense of reproductive structures, like flowers and seed pods.  Additionally, we are beginning a project on Pitch Pine, the dominant species of the New Jersey Pinelands, and are interested in how its various defenses function against specialist and generalist herbivores, including bark beetles. 

Together with Aaron Windsor at Duke University, I have developed a teaching exercise for molecular genetics that includes a Python program for generating sequence datasets.  If you are an instructor interested in our teaching lab, please contact me and/or go to the teaching exercise page for more information.

Education

Postdoctoral training, Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology, Jena, Germany, 2001-2004
Ph.D., Dartmouth College, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, 2001
B.A., Wellesley College, Biology, 1993

Selected conference presentations and publications

Shumate, A.M., P. Broek, and D. Odom.  Role of the indigenous forest community in resisting or facilitating range expansion by a forest pest: Southern pine beetles in New Jersey’s Pinelands. August 2009, Annual Meeting of the Ecological Society of America, Albuquerque, NM.

Knight, C.A., H. Vogel, J. Kroymann, A. Shumate,  H. Witsenboer, and T. Mitchell-Olds.  2006.  Expression profiling and local adaptation of Boechera holboellii populations for water use efficiency across a naturally occurring water stress gradient.  Molecular Ecology 15(5), 1229–1237.

Shumate, A.M., and A.J. Windsor.  Identifying patterns of molecular evolution in plants: a teaching exercise.  June 2006, Society for the Study of Evolution, Stony Brook, NY.

Shumate, A.M., A.J. Windsor and T. Mitchell-Olds. Glucosinolate defense and insect response: genetic variation in two wild Arabidopsis relatives.  June 2004, Society for the Study of Evolution, Fort Collins, CO.

Shumate, A.M., and T. Mitchell-Olds. Variation in glucosinolate profiles for populations of North American Arabis.  June 2003, Society for the Study of Evolution, Chico, CA.

Shumate, A.M. Natural variation in species interactions: phenotypic analysis.  November, 2002, Special Symposium on Ecology and Biodiversity Research, Krakow, Poland.

Shumate, A.M. and M.P. Ayres.  1999.  Selection on pheromone production and preference in Ips pini.  In: Hayes, J.L.; Raffa, K.F. eds.  Proceedings of a workshop on bark beetle genetics: current status of research, July 17-18 1998, Madison, Wisconsin.  Gen. Tech. Rep. PNW-GTR-466.  Portland, OR: USDA Forest Service.

Ayres, M.P., M.J. Lombardero, B.D. Ayres, A.M. Shumate and A.E. Santoro.  1999.  The biology and management of bark beetles in old growth pine forests of Itasca State Park.  Great Lakes Institute for Pine Ecosystem Research, Colfax, Wisconsin.  128 pp.