Teaching Assistants

Jessica R. Litman, PhD student
Email: jrl72@cornell.edu

My name is Jesse Litman and I'm a third year graduate student in Bryan Danforth's lab. I am studying the systematics and biogeography of a small tribe of megachilid bees living in Africa and South America. I'll be traveling to South Africa to collect bees during the first few of weeks of the semester but look forward to working with you when I get back.

Eric Denemark, Undergraduate major in Entomology
Email: edd23@cornell.edu

My name is Eric Denemark and I'm a senior entomology major. I enjoy helping people learn about insects, and Alien Empire '09 will be the fifth entomology class I have TA'd for. You can often find me working in Dr. John Losey's lab on the fourth floor of Comstock Hall. My senior thesis concerns a phenomenon called “Ladybug Wash-ups”. For this study I am borrowing ideas from forensic entomology to study the ecology of ladybugs. If all goes according to plan, I will be training as a forensic entomologist in graduate school next year. I am always available for questions via email, edd23@cornell.edu. Knowing the teaching team for this class, I think everyone will have a lot of fun in Alien Empire this semester.

Jenna DeNicola, Undergraduate major in Entomology
Email: jcd49@cornell.edu

My name is Jenna DeNicola, and I’m a senior majoring in Entomology and Animal Science. This is my second experience as an entomology TA (some of you may know me from Spider Biology), and I’m very excited for this semester of Alien Empire! Most often you’ll find me in Dr. Linda Rayor’s lab on the fourth floor of Comstock Hall. I’ll either be feeding spiders or working on my senior thesis project on the social behavior of an Australian huntsman spider. My email is jcd49@cornell.edu, and you can reach me there for questions or comments at any time. I hope you all will enjoy this taking course as much as I think I will TA-ing it!