PELLSTON, Mich. — Generating knowledge and sharing discoveries, both big and small, are driving forces that inspire scientists all over the world.

And you don’t have to wait to be in graduate school to do it.

The University of Michigan Biological Station offers undergraduate students the chance to engage deeply with nature and the scientific process, from hypothesis to publication.

Students in one particular class that bridges the humanities and sciences at the campus in northern Michigan recently had their research paper about allies in the wild published in the journal Ecology and Evolution.

It’s a first co-authorship for undergraduate students enrolled in the Insights From Trees course during the four-week summer term in 2024 at UMBS, including Lillian Bailey, Ashley Cole, Bailee Duke, Liam Estill, Lauren Jones, Gabrielle Leon and Nia Paton. Samantha Molino and Addison Yerks were also undergraduate student researchers at UMBS last year who helped on the project.

UMBS student Lauren Jones in a hammock along Douglas Lake in July 2024. Photo courtesy: Marc-Grégor Campredon, U-M Office of University Development

“It was a far-fetched dream of mine to be able to conduct research and to be a published scientific author, but I never dreamed that I would be able to achieve that with such a wonderful support system before I received my undergraduate degree,” said Lauren Jones, a senior at U-M in the Program in the Environment (PitE) who is simultaneously a first-year graduate student in the U-M School for Environment and Sustainability (SEAS) through an accelerated master’s program.

The resulting research paper is one of several outcomes of the multi-disciplinary class. Dr. Marjorie Weber, the instructor, paired a scientific toolkit with other lenses of art, economics, ethics and the environment.

“A keen scientific training is one important tool through which students can learn to see the world as critical thinkers,” said Weber, an associate professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Michigan who leads the summer course at UMBS, titled Insights from Trees: Science, Art, and Observation in a Noisy World (EEB 405).

“The power of scientific critical thinking will enable their success and creativity regardless of what type of career and interests they ultimately pursue.”

Dr. Marjorie Weber, an associate professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Michigan, leads her summer course at UMBS in 2024, titled Insights from Trees: Science, Art, and Observation in a Noisy World (EEB 405). Photo courtesy: Marc-Grégor Campredon, U-M Office of University Development

Passion and Curiosity

The benefit is mutual. The experience enriches both the professional growth of the students and the work being done in Weber’s lab.

Weber is an early-career Michigan faculty member pushing boundaries with her evolutionary ecology research supported by a more than $1 million National Science Foundation CAREER grant.

In the summer, she teaches the Insights From Trees class in synergy with her own ongoing research program on woody plants and their herbivores and pathogens at UMBS, one of the nation’s largest and longest continuously operating field research stations, located about 20 miles south of the Mackinac Bridge.

Laboratories, classrooms and cabins are nestled along Douglas Lake’s South Fishtail Bay in Pellston, making up a small portion of the more than 10,000 forested acres that UMBS has stewarded since 1909.

“At the start of our second week of classes, Professor Weber told us we would be participating in a research project,” said Gabi Leon, a junior at U-M double majoring in ecology and evolutionary biology and Spanish. “I just assumed it would be a mock research project simulation to learn about the research process. However, when we began formulating a procedure, hypothesizing as a class, and gathering materials for data collection, I was pleasantly surprised to see a real scientific investigation begin.”

“Honestly, I immediately realized that I had stumbled into the best class that I'll ever take,” Jones said. “Before UMBS, I had only learned about the scientific process from an outsider's perspective. Being incorporated into it has been wildly interesting and has inspired me to learn more and to become more well-versed in the intricate methodologies that legitimate research must follow.”

Microscope image of a mite in a domatium. Photo courtesy: Rosy Glos

The Insights From Trees course debuted at UMBS last summer. As part of the curriculum in July 2024, the students evaluated the abundance of mites on foliage from woody plant species.

Mites are tiny invertebrates that typically live on plants in small chambers known as domatia made by tiny hairs on the underbellies of leaves.

They are a focus of Professor Weber’s research studying plant-protecting animals and other wonders of evolution.

She studies pollinators, cases where animals protect trees (ants and mites serving as bodyguards to plants) and the way trees defend themselves from pests and plant disease.

“Plants have evolved remarkable traits to facilitate mutualistic relationships, developing adaptations to attract and sustain protective partners,” Weber said. “Here, we systematically surveyed a forest at the Biological Station for one of the most common and ancient defense mutualism phenotypes: mite domatia.”

Weber said mite domatia have been historically overlooked in research, but in places like the forests of Michigan, they play a large role in protecting trees. 

It’s a two-way street where mites might eat smaller herbivores and pathogens on the leaf and then protect the plant in exchange for shelter in the domatia.

Students in the Insights from Trees course spent July 16, 2024, collecting data in UMBS woods, looking for mites on the foliage of woody plants. Photo from Dr. Marjorie Weber.

Performing Research

The class assignment built on previous work linking domatia and mite abundance in other forests outside of Michigan.

The class scored the 16 most common woody species for the presence and number of mite domatia and found that 80% of common woody species in the forest had mite domatia, the highest reported percentage of mite domatia in any survey ever conducted.

Walking their way through the forest, the students sampled five leaves per plant for up to 10 plants for each species. They put the leaves in plastic bags with a damp paper towel and stored them in a cooler to keep mites and leaves from dehydrating and withering.

The students took the bagged-up leaves to the lab where the class used microscopes to quantify domatia and mite presence and abundance under the guidance of Weber and Ph.D. students in her lab.

The tufts of hair on the plant are mite domatia. Photo from Dr. Marjorie Weber.

To evaluate their samples, the team conducted a series of what are called phylogenetic models, which test whether the number of mites found on a leaf are related to the number of domatia on that leaf, taking into account the variation in leaves found across 16 species they examined.

Their research showed that plants with mite domatia had significantly more mites on their leaves than species that lacked mite domatia, and that plants with more domatia had more mites.

The study also points to northern temperate forests as a promising system for studying mite–plant mutualisms in high densities in the future.

“This whole process opened my eyes to the accessibility of science and that scientific investigation isn't just about sitting in a lab and using fancy machinery, but about having a question and your efforts together as a group to find an answer,” Leon said.

The Insights From Trees class photo in July 2024 at UMBS outside of their classroom. Photo courtesy: Dr. Marjorie Weber

Becoming a Scientist

After the students and professor stayed in communication through the fall and winter to work together to draft and submit a paper about their findings, the scientific journal Ecology and Evolution published their work in April 2025.

“In the world of research, the peer-review process upholds scientific integrity and quality,” Weber said. “Our team worked hard, and we’re thrilled the science community can engage with what we learned.”

When Weber notified the students their paper was accepted eight months after their field course ended at UMBS, Jones immediately shared the big news with her family and boyfriend.

“Being a published researcher, and being able to wear that title proudly, feels amazing and has brought me a deep sense of accomplishment for all the learning and work we have done,” Jones said.

UMBS student Gabi Leon shows a page in her notebook celebrating a northern red oak tree she studied during the 2024 summer term at UMBS. Photo courtesy: Marc-Grégor Campredon, U-M Office of University Development

“Working in Dr. Weber's class gave me powerful insight into the scientific process and allowed me to see what is possible for myself in future investigations,” Leon said.

Leon, Jones and all of their fellow undergraduate students in the class are listed as co-authors on the study, titled “Mite domatia and associated mite density in a North American Eastern Deciduous Forest in Michigan,” along with graduate students who work in Weber’s laboratory or served as a teaching assistant (TA).

“UMBS isn’t just about earning credits,” said Annie Cress, a TA for the class and UMBS alumna who is now a Ph.D. student at the University of Texas at Austin, “It’s a place where you build deep connections with brilliant peers and faculty who become lifelong mentors.” 

On July 15, 2024, U-M Ph.D. student Carolyn Graham talked with students in the Insights from Trees class in their classroom at the University of Michigan Biological Station.

Dr. Carolyn Graham, who works in the Weber Lab at U-M and recently defended her Ph.D. in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, is the lead author on the published research. In advance of the course, she helped Weber brainstorm research projects that could be completed in the Insights From Trees class and would complement its themes.

“The goal was to reveal the entire process of turning a research question into methods, interpreting results, and getting that work all the way to publication,” Graham said. “I hope the students now have a clear idea of what the process of publishing a paper looks like, because it was completely foreign to me the first time I started the process as an early graduate student. STEM education and mentorship are huge components of my mission as an early-career scientist, and I hope to be publishing papers with undergraduates for my whole career.”

“We’re better together, kind of like the plants and mites that our research is focused on,” Weber said. “I’m proud to work with students to learn about this particular collaboration in the tree of life. And we have so much more to learn.”

Weber is teaching the Insights From Trees course during the summer 2025 term (July 1-31). The application deadline is May 30. Go to the UMBS Courses website to apply.

Learn more about Weber’s class on its website: Insights from Trees: Science, Art, and Observation in a Noisy World (EEB 405).

Scroll below for more photos from the Insights From Trees class.

The University of Michigan Biological Station serves 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.

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Samantha Molino, a junior at U-M and the 2024 Bach-Hazlett Fellow at UMBS, was an undergraduate student researcher at the campus in northern Michigan. She worked on the research project along with the Insights From Trees class and is a co-author on the published paper. She is pictured cutting a sample in July 2024. Photo from Samantha Molino.
Throughout the Insights from Trees course, students familiarized themselves with different individual trees on campus at UMBS. UMBS student Ashley Cole, a senior at U-M, is pictured in the woods in July 2024. She is a co-author on the published research. Photo from Dr. Majorie Weber.
Liam Estill was a sophomore at U-M when he took the Insights From Trees course at UMBS in July 2024. Liam is a co-author on the published research. Photo from Dr. Marjorie Weber.
UMBS students Lillian Bailey and Lauren Jones in the Insights From Trees classroom in July 2024. Photo courtesy: Marc-Grégor Campredon, U-M Office of University Development
Student Nia Paton at UMBS in July 2024 when she was a junior at U-M. Nia is a co-author on the published research. Photo from Dr. Marjorie Weber.
Emmy Dawson-Glass works in the field at UMBS in July 2024. Emmy is a Ph.D. student at U-M working in the Weber Lab. She is a co-author on the published research. Photo courtesy: Marc-Grégor Campredon, U-M Office of University Development
A student sketches in a notebook during the UMBS Insights From Trees class in July 2024. Photo courtesy: Marc-Grégor Campredon, U-M Office of University Development
Dr. Marjorie Weber, an associate professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Michigan who leads the summer course at UMBS, titled Insights from Trees: Science, Art, and Observation in a Noisy World (EEB 405). Photo from Weber.