Texas AgriLife Research Honors Entomology with Vice Chancellor's Award in Excellence and Faculty Fellow Recognition
Otto Strey, left, and Dr. Micky Eubanks with their awards. Eubanks received honors as the 2010 Faculty Fellow and Strey was awarded with the Vice Chancellor's Award in Excellence for On-Campus Research Support. Texas AgriLife Research recently awarded honors to two of the Entomology Department’s members this past March during a special awards ceremony in the new AgriLife Headquarters building.
Dr. Micky Eubanks was recognized as a 2010 Texas AgriLife Research Fellow and Mr. Otto Strey received the Vice Chancellor's Award in Excellence for On-Campus Research Support.
Eubanks, a professor with the Department, was honored for several achievements, including developing new, highly attractive fire ant bait technology based on knowledge gained from basic studies of fire ant nutritional ecology and foraging behavior and quantifying aphid-induced plant defenses in cotton and the importance of plant defenses in increasing plant resistance to insect pests.
Eubanks' internationally recognized skills in the areas of community ecology and arthropod-host interactions have enhanced the Department’s teaching and research programs. His work has led to great advancements in the understanding of the basic biology underlying these phenomena, which is leading to applications that will mitigate problems caused by invasive ants, insect pests of crop plants, and pathogens of plants and animals.
In the past five years, Eubanks has been principal or co-principal investigator on more than $4 million in grants from a wide variety of sources, including the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, USDA, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He has authored 22 peer-reviewed publications and one book chapter, and co-authored a graduate-level insect ecology textbook.
His students consistently win paper-presentation competitions on a national level as well as university and professional-society awards. Eubanks has served as a committee chair or co-chair for 10 graduate students and as a committee member for 15 others.
“Dr. Eubanks is a vital component to the success of Entomology at Texas A&M University beyond the numerous successes,” the nominating letter read. “Dr. Eubanks is an exceptionally collegial faculty who has a talent for bringing together stakeholders, students and faculty from diverse perspectives into highly productive teams.”
Otto Strey was recognized with the Vice Chancellor’s Award in Excellence for Support Personnel, On Campus Research Support. Strey, a senior research associate and manager of Dr. Pete Teel’s Tick Research Laboratory received the award for his 23 years of dedication of research and service in the lab. Strey has worked on projects and various collaborations, including working with researchers at the University of Texas Health Science Center by providing and screening field collections of tick species in public and private lands in Southeast Texas as well as supporting and maintaining colonies for researchers.
Strey has provided in-laboratory training and field techniques on tick ecology and surveillance to Army, Navy and Air Force military officers working on theses and dissertations at the Tick Lab. Strey has also helped other Department of Defense personnel with the Medical Services Corps from Fort Hood and Brooks Air Force Base.
“Otto strives for excellence and professionalism in every aspect of his work, and in every case his accomplishments have brought accolades to Texas AgriLife,” Dr. Pete Teel said. “He truly is an ambassador for our programs."