George Roderick

Title: 
William Muriece Hoskins Chair and Distingushed Professor, ESPM
Bio: 

Positions

Academic Positions

  • University of California, Berkeley, ESPM 1999 - present
  • St. Anne's College and Department of Biology, Oxford, 2023 - 2024
  • INRAE, Montpellier, France, 2006 - 2007
  • University of Hawaii, Manoa, 1994 - 1999
  • University of Maryland, College Park, 1990 - 1993

Education

  • Wilderness First Aid, Sierra Rescue, 2025
  • Postdoctoral Researcher, Entomology, University of Maryland, College Park, 1988-1989
  • PhD, Zoology, University of California, Berkeley, 1987
  • AB summa cum laude, Biology, Dartmouth College, 1981

Research Description:

Professor Roderick’s research focuses on global change, especially the impact of global biological homogenization caused by biological invasions.  The work addresses basic and applied questions, taking advantage of the opportunities associated with the geography of the Pacific Basin, Pacific Islands, Pacific Rim, and California.  Research includes studies of the origins of both endemic and non-indigenous organisms, processes associated with colonization and invasion, population structure, species interactions, and response to change.  Approaches include field manipulations, natural experiments, data science, GIS, niche modeling, eDNA, population genomics, and collections-based research. Questions address colonizations and history in geological time, such as the assembly of ecological communities in the Pacific islands, and recent biological invasions, their causes, impacts, and solutions, including those of disease vectors and biological control.  Research collaborations include the Moorea BioCode Project, Island Digital Ecosystem Avatars (IDEA), NSF Hawaii Dimensions, and a recent SERDP-funded project using eDNA to monitor invasive terrestrial arthropods in the Pacific.

Professor Roderick’s research has appeared in Science, Nature, Nature Reviews Genetics, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, Ecosphere, Global Ecology and Biogeography, Global Change Biology, Ecological Applications, Journal of Biogeography,  Biological Invasions, GigaScience, Ecology, Ecology Letters, American Naturalist, Annual Review of Entomology, Trends in Ecology and Evolution, Molecular Ecology, Biological Control, Genetics, Evolution, Current Biology, PLoS Biology, PLoS One, Peer J, Zootaxa, among other journals. He has edited two volumes, Evolution and Biological Control (2012) and DNA Barcoding of Life (2005).

Professor Roderick holds the William Muriece Hoskins Endowed Chair of Chemical and Molecular Entomology, and is Senior Research Fellow with the Center for Tropical Research, Institute of the Environment, UCLA, and a member of the Center for Invasive Species Research, UC Riverside.  He has served the State Department, National Science Foundation, US Environmental Protection Agency, and US Department of Agriculture, in various capacities, including chairing the first Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum's workshop on Alien Invasive Species, which included 17 economies in Beijing in 2005.

Professor Roderick is currently Faculty Director for UC’s Gump South Pacific Research Station in French Polynesia. At UC Berkeley, he chaired the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management (2014-19), and the Academic Senate Committee on Research, and served on Academic Senate Committtees for Campus & Interdepartmental Relations (Budget) and International Education.  Recent teaching includes the ecology/environment section of Introductory Biology (Bio1B), the Berkeley "Moorea Class" (ESPM C107/IB 158LF)  and a new "Island Sustatinability Semester" (ESPM 109A-E).

Honors and Awards

    • Plumer Visiting Research Fellow, St. Anne's College, University of Oxford, 2023
    • Visiting Professor, Department of Biology, University of Oxford, 2023 - 2024
    • Top Scholar, ScholarGPS.com, Invasion Biology, Molecular Ecology, Environmental Science, 2024
    • Distinguished Professor of ESPM, UC Berkeley, 2019 -
    • Scientific Teaching Fellow, National Institute on Scientific Teaching, 2018
    • Distinguished Teaching Award, College of Natural Resources, UC Berkeley, 2013
    • Western Assoc. AES Directors Award for Excellence in Research (shared), 2010
    • Fulbright Scholar and Foreign Researcher, INRAE, Montpellier, France, 2006 - 2007
    • Fellow, California Academy of Sciences, 2004 -
    • Fellow, Royal Entomological Society, London, 2001 -
    • Regents Medal for Excellence in Research, University of Hawaii, 1998
    • Phi Beta Kappa, Dartmouth College, 1980

Recent Teaching:

Other Information

Research interests: 

global change, invasive species, nature, genomic observatories, environmental science, sustainability, insects

Role: 
Faculty
Organisms & Environment
Headshot of George Roderick

Contact

roderick@berkeley.edu
343 Hilgard Hall, Berkeley, CA 94720