Humans of Tyson 2024
Katie Westby
Tyson Staff Scientist
Co-Principal Investigator, Team Skeet
“I was one of those people who had that moment where I said, ‘Yeah, that is the coolest thing I’ve ever heard and I want to do that.’”
Returning to Tyson for her 13th field season, Katie Westby is continuing her long-standing mosquito ecology research, particularly analyzing the impacts of urbanization and climate change on mosquito behavior and resilience.
“Most people I know who study mosquitos were not always into mosquitos. They studied biology and then discovered that mosquitoes were a cool study system. I’m definitely not that person. I’ve always been into mosquitos. My first research was collecting mosquitoes and ticks in the wild and testing them for pathogens because I’ve always been interested in asking more ecological and evolutionary questions: for example, how will mosquitoes respond to all of the things we throw at them: urbanization, climate change? If they’re not able to withstand these, they’re not going to be able to continue spreading disease.”
Where did such niche interest in mosquitoes arise in the first place?
“As an undergrad, I was a transfer student from community college, so I started my major in my junior year. I took a class on the geography of health and infectious disease and learned all about these crazy insects and the crazy diseases and parasites that they transferred. I really thought I wanted to go into the public health side of vector-borne disease, so I did a master’s in public health. But I realized pretty quickly I was more interested in the science aspect!”