The University of Michigan Biological Station is seeking applicants for our summer 2026 undergraduate research program. This eight-week program pairs student fellows with UMBS science mentors for original research in field ecology. This opportunity is aimed toward undergraduate students and provides hands-on training and knowledge-building in analytical, applied field methods, data collection and management, and science communication skills.
Who We Are
The University of Michigan Biological Station (UMBS) has been home to scientific discovery since its founding in 1909. Our core mission is to serve as a gathering place to learn from the natural world, advance research and education, and inspire action. We leverage over a century of research and transformative experiences to drive discoveries and solutions to benefit Michigan and beyond.
Students and scientists live and work as a community to learn from nature and place at UMBS, which is one of the nation’s largest and longest continuously operating field research stations.
Located in Pellston, Michigan, laboratories, classrooms and cabins are tucked into more than 10,000 forested acres along Douglas Lake and Burt Lake to support long-term science research and education. Researchers have access to a diversity of ecosystems and natural communities.
Internship Summary
- This is a full-time, residential experience
- The program will run June 15 – August 7, 2026
- A stipend of $5,500, on-site housing and meals will be provided
- Research expenses will be covered
- Fellows will participate in skill-building workshops and interact with other visiting researchers performing their own research projects at UMBS.
The range of intern projects is broad and focused on the natural systems and climate change. Student Fellows are encouraged to explore their own interests within the scope of the program. Previous student research projects have included disturbance forest ecology and carbon sequestration, disease ecology, forest ecosystem function and stability, and microbial ecology and global climate change. You will be matched with a mentor and project after you are admitted. Fellows will also participate in weekly meetings, skill-building workshops, UMBS lecture series and student research presentations.
To Apply:
Send the following materials in one file (.pdf) to umbsresearch@umich.edu by March 15, 2026:
- Resume or CV, including a list of relevant courses and research experience
- One-page statement on why you are interested in this opportunity, highlighting experience and specific research interests.
- Contact information for two academic or professional references.
2026 Mentor and Project List:
Biological, Chemical and Physical Influences on Milkweed Plants and Herbivores
Alison Bennet, Associate Professor, Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology, Ohio State University
In this project we are exploring how soil microbes, chemistry, and physics influence milkweed plants and their interactions with herbivores. Previous research in this system has shown that the soil microbe arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi influences milkweed chemistry and plant interactions. However, this previous work has ignored the existing arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal community within the soil as well as the influence of the existing soil and other soil microbes. Here we aim to explore the native interactions between milkweeds, arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, and the soil microbiome to understand their impact on plant chemistry and herbivore abundance.
Atmospheric Moisture Transport and Great Lakes Forests
Adriana Raudzens Bailey, Assistant Professor of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Michigan
The way water cycles into or out of Michigan's forested landscapes will surely change as the Great Lakes region warms. The goal of this project is to reveal the circulation and flow patterns that steer moisture in and out of the Great Lakes Region and to quantify how much of the moisture exchange between the land surface and atmosphere is driven by loss through forest plants, as they respond to water stress under warmer conditions. You will have an opportunity to work directly with meteorological measurements from the Biological Station (e.g. measurements of water vapor concentration and estimates of evaporation from the UMBS observational towers) and evaluate the in-situ measurements in the context of large-scale weather model output.
Ice Storm Response, Disturbance Interactions, and Carbon Cycling in Forests
Robert Fahey, Associate Professor, Department of Natural Resources and the Environment, Center for Environmental Sciences and Engineering, University of Connecticut
The changing frequency and scale of disturbances in forests is producing more instances of interacting disturbance, with uncertain consequences for ecosystem functions such as carbon cycling. In this project we are focusing on the March 2025 ice storm that impacted northern Michigan and assessing how its effects differed across multiple existing long-term disturbance experiments at UMBS to better understand the effect of prior disturbance severity, pattern, and timing on forest ecosystem response to compounding disturbance. The primary goal of the student fellow project for 2026 will be to evaluate the resistance of forest productivity to the ice storm disturbance. The student fellow will gain experience with field-based forest measurements, remote sensing of forest structure using terrestrial and aerial LiDAR, and analysis of forest carbon cycling.
Managing Biological Invasions: How the Order of Species Removal Shapes Wetland Restoration
Mariano Rodriguez-Cabal & Shane Lishawa, Rubenstein School of the Environment and Natural Resources, University of Vermont & School of Environmental Sustainability, Loyola University Chicago
Non-native species pose a major threat to ecosystem functioning worldwide, with wetlands—recognized as global “hotspots” of biodiversity and productivity—being particularly vulnerable. Practitioners and managers often restore ecosystems by removing undesired species, yet the order and timing of these removals can strongly influence community recovery and increase the risk of secondary invasion. Despite this, the consequences of removal sequence remain poorly understood. As a result, there is an urgent need to understand how the order of invasive species removal shapes community reassembly, biodiversity, and ecosystem processes in wetlands. A student working with us will have the opportunity to explore food web responses to invasive species removal through experimental manipulations in Great Lakes coastal wetlands, gaining hands-on experience in fieldwork, managing experimental plots, measuring plant and macroinvertebrate diversity and functional traits, and studying interactions among herbivory, predation, and environmental change. This position offers rigorous training in experimental design and ecological monitoring, collaboration within an active research team, and the opportunity to contribute to research addressing global environmental change.
Plant-Soil-Insect Interactions in a Changing World
Aimée Classen, Director and Professor, University of Michigan Biological Station and Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Michigan
We are exploring the role of herbivores and pathogenic fungi on communities (as part of the global BugNet network). This summer we are looking to explore how herbivore and pathogenic fungi impact ecosystem functions across a growing season. We also work in the DRAGNet project that manipulates disturbance and nutrient inputs into Oldfield ecosystems. We are excited to host a student who might be interested in working in either of these experiments with us this summer to explore new questions.
Thermoregulatory Tradeoffs in Birds and Insects
Charlotte Probst, PhD Student Researcher, School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan
As the world warms, species are increasingly expected to encounter temperatures that lie above their historical norms. In hot temperatures, individuals are expected to increase time spent on thermoregulation--for example, seeking shade or reducing activity levels. However, this reduced activity means less time available for foraging or other behaviors, such as territorial defense. Our study examines the cross-trophic consequences of thermoregulatory tradeoffs by quantifying bird activity levels (via bioacoustic monitoring and predation surveys), insect activity (via insect traps), and herbivory (through vegetation surveys). Students will gain hands-on field experience maintaining a bioacoustic array, conducting predation surveys, collecting and identifying insects, and quantifying leaf herbivory.
Understanding Plant-Pollinator Interactions under Global Change
Mary A. Jamieson, PhD, Associate Professor of Biological Sciences, Oakland University
Pollinators play a critical role in terrestrial ecosystems, but unfortunately many species have experienced significant declines in recent years due to a variety of emerging threats. Our research aims to understand how plant and pollinator communities change over time and space as a result of global environmental change factors, such as land-use change, warming temperatures, altered precipitation patterns, and invasive species. This summer, we will survey plant and pollinator communities to assess changes in phenology, species interactions, and other community traits over time by comparing contemporary and historical data sets.
