University of Richmond Professor Receives $34,600 Supplement to NSF Grant
May 26, 2005
Rafael de Sá, associate professor of biology at the University of Richmond, has received a $34,600 supplement to an earlier grant from the National Science Foundation. The supplement brings his total funding from the grant to $366,974.
de Sá, whose primary research interest is systematics, evolution and development of amphibians, is researching a project titled “Diversity Beyond Morphology: A Revision of the Frog Genus Leptodactylus (Amphibia, Anura, Leptodactylidae).”
The supplement is part of a program to promote collaboration between U.S. institutions with NSF grants and institutions of the Consortium of European Taxonomic Facilities.
de Sá is collaborating with the Natural History Museum in London on understanding the genealogical relationships of the Leptodactylus species inhabiting the Caribbean and how they relate to species that live on the mainland. The research will take into account geographical and geological changes of the past to account for the present patterns of distribution of the species.
Work will take place in Richmond and London. A graduate student from London will work in de Sá’s laboratory for two months in 2005 and again in 2006.