Dr. Tyler Achatz, MGA assistant professor of biology who earlier this spring won the 2022 American Society of Parasitologists’ (ASP) Ashton Cuckler New Investigator Award, has now won the Excellence in Dissertation Writing Award by the University of North Dakota. From the award description: "This award is given to a student who produced a dissertation of outstanding quality. An exceptional dissertation is determined by the importance/impact of the subject, originality/creativity of the work, quality of the scholarship, organization of the dissertation, and quality of the writing."
The title of Achatz's dissertation is "Phylogeny and systematics of the superfamily Diplostomoidea Poirier, 1886 (Platyhelminthes: Trematoda)." His research focuses on a diversity of questions related to parasites. His primary interests lie in the study of the evolutionary history and systematics of flatworm parasites as well as their co-evolutionary relationships with their hosts. Many of the worms he works with are associated with a wide variety of fish diseases. His studies have begun to reveal the true agents of these diseases by matching many of these larval parasites with their adult stages. (Achatz has also worked on projects related to the Zika virus as well surveys of ticks and their diseases in North Dakota.)
