Active Lab Members

---

Marguerite Butler

Interests: Elucidating the mechanistic bases underlying adaptive diversification

After graduating from Mililani High School, Butler received her B.S. in Interdisciplinary Science (Physics, Mathematics, and Biology) and M.S. in Microbiology from Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute, and a Ph.D. in Evolutionary and Population Biology from Washington University in St. Louis. She was awarded an NSF Sloan Postdoctoral Fellowship and the JSPS Postdoctoral Fellowship which she accepted to study phylogenetics at the Institute of Statistical Mathematics in Tokyo, followed by an NRSA-NIH Postdoctoral Fellowship to study functional morphology at UC Berkeley. She started as an Assistant Professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville before moving to University of Hawaiʻi at Manoa where she is currently a Professor. Butler has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the Army Research Office, and the Air Force Research Labs. Butler currently serves as Associate Editor for Integrative Organismal Biology, Member at Large for the Executive Committee of the Society of Integrative and Comparative Biology, and other committees.  Butler is past Chair of the Manoa Faculty Senate and past member of the Study Abroad Council at UH. Butler teaches animal physiology and laboratory, introductory biology, macroevolution, programming in R for biologists, and graduate seminars in functional morphology, visual ecology, and evolution. The Butler Lab trains graduate students and postdocs, and welcomes undergraduates and high school students interested in research. The lab started “Biodiversity in my community” an outreach program for middle schoolers in Papua New Guinea, Hawaii, and beyond to empower students to study their own biodiversity, and appreciate the connections between humans, culture, and the land. 

Ethan Hill

Interests: Phylogenetics, ecomorphology, and microbiome

Ethan is pursuing a MS in microbiology as a member of the Butler Lab at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, after completing his B.S. in Biology in 2018. Ethan is interested in understanding the evolutionary process of rapid speciation through the study of phylogenetics and ecomorphology, as well as exploring community structure and dynamics of microbiomes. His previous research in the Butler lab includes updating a comprehensive phylogeny of Asterophryne microhylid frogs from Papua New Guinea; classifying ecomorphs of an isolated montane community; and contributing to research investigating the functional morphology and biomechanics of the larger clade. Ethan is interested in developing genomic methods to capture eukaryotic and archaea microbial diversity in addition to the bacterial components that are typically focused on in characterizing microbiome diversity.

Claire Fraser

Interests: Medical physiology and microbiome

Claire is an MS student in the Butler lab in the Microbiology program. She earned her B.A. in Biology from the University of Hawai’i at Manoa in 2017, where she began her work in the Butler lab on the biomechanics of locomotion in microhylid frogs and analysis of morphology through DiceCT (Diffusible Iodine-Based Contrast-Enhanced Computed Tomography) and traditional dissection methods. Claire is interested in studying the microbiome of amphibians in relation to the fatal chytrid fungal disease, specifically the microbial community of individuals immune to chytridiomycosis. 

Mary Jarman

Interests: Phylogenetics of Papuan microhylid frogs, veterinary medicine

Tim Tam

Interests: Socialization, non-verbal communication, and carbohydrates

Lab Alumni

---

Former Graduate Students

Former Postdocs

Jason Pienaar, Assistant Professor, University of Alabama

Justin Walguarnery, Temporary Assistant Professor, University of Hawaiʻi

Roland Schroeder, Advisor, Bundesagentur für Arbeit, Germany