Mikayla Struble

I am an undergraduate student at Montana State University. I grew up in Columbus, Ohio and began an earnest interest in biology when I was young. I love biological illustration and draw as often as I can in my free time. I have collected bones, skeletons, and skulls as a hobby since I was about 7 but have advanced that interest to academic research as I have begun my college career. I began research my freshman year, focusing on the study of paleogenomics which is more or less the change in genome size in large clades through time. This research has resulted in three publications (the last one awaiting approval). I presented a talk at the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology in 2015 on that topic. I am moving on from that topic to study foot morphology in birds of prey. I will be applying for grad school next year to begin attending another university for my PhD in 2018, hopefully focusing on predator/prey relations among mammals in the Eocene, focusing on Creodont ecological niches.

March 2016