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May 29, 2007

Faculty

Professor receives national award

The biology researcher is one of 17 people ever to earn the accolade.

Story by: J. Blankenship

Contributor to The Shorthorn

Jonathan Campbell brought home creepy crawlers as a child. He didn’t know his hobby would become a fulfilling career with national recognition.

The biology professor’s name is now among a short list of experts in the country. Campbell received the W. Frank Blair Eminent Naturalist Award in April as recognition for excellence in a lifetime commitment to outstanding study or conservation of the flora or fauna.

“Any one of his bigger projects would have been a lifetime achievement for most people,” said Darrel Frost, curator at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

Frost nominated Dr. Campbell for the award.

“Over 40 percent of all amphibians have been named since 1985, and Jonathan has named a substantial number of them himself,” Frost said.

Campbell was thrilled and surprised to be one of 17 people ever to earn the award.

“I was one of those kids who came home with toads in my pockets, and I just never outgrew it,” he said. “I didn’t realize I could make a living at it.”

His hobby developed into a career and spread to other continents. Campbell published more than 130 peer-reviewed papers and authored or edited five books. His most notable, Venomous Reptiles of the Western Hemisphere, is one of his greatest achievements.

“People are generally under the impression that we already know everything about [reptilian and amphibian] vertebrae, but we don’t,” Campbell said. “I love being in the jungle and the wild collecting information and species.”

He’ll be marching through Mexico in June researching and naming creatures. He is a world expert on amphibians and reptiles of the Americas. His work in Central American remote areas, especially in Guatemala, resulted in the discovery and description of more than 100 new vertebrates.

The Southwestern Association of Naturalists presented the award. Founded in 1953, they promote the field study of plants and animals in the Southwestern United States, Mexico and Central America.

Campbell shared his devotion with students, who gave him compliments in the form of names. There aren’t many people who can say they have a toad and a parasite named after them, but Campbell can.

One creature he describes as a fat, ugly toad discovered by his former students was officially named Bufo campbelli. Another new parasite is named Entomelas campbelli.

“That is a hideous gut parasite discovered in a lizard,” Campbell said. “It’s really a hideous worm.”