This story was originally published in the 2024 edition of Discovery magazine, the College of Science's publication. This edition of Discovery celebrated the 20th anniversary of the College of Science.
"Ours is a world of sights and sounds. We live by our eyes and ears and tend generally to be oblivious to the chemical happenings in our surrounds. Such happenings are ubiquitous. All organisms engender chemical signals, and all, in their respective ways, respond to the chemical emissions of others. … And it is a discipline in which discovery is still very much in order, for the interactions themselves remain in large measure to be uncovered." – Jerrold Meinwald and Thomas Eisner, 1995
The last part of the first paragraph of Meinwald and Eisner’s abstract in their review article "Chemical Ecology" is just as true today as it was when it was published 30 years ago. There are a growing number of chemical ecologists, and many of them are being trained at the University’s Hitchcock Center for Chemical Ecology.
The Hitchcock Center is named for its founding donor, Mick Hitchcock. Hitchcock is an adjunct faculty member in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, and worked in the pharmaceutical industry for many years, helping to develop antiviral drugs, including the first once-daily three-drug combination pill to treat human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Hitchcock moved to Reno in 2009 (largely due to its proximity to good snowboarding) and has been involved at the University since.
Christopher Jeffrey, a professor in the Department of Chemistry, started at the University the same day Hitchcock was giving a talk. Jeffrey attended the talk and later, the two had dinner together. Following this initial interaction, Jeffrey and Hitchcock began to talk about chemistry on a regular basis over dinners and started snowboarding together.
"[Mick] got to learn about what our research was, and it fell in line with exactly how he felt the future of science is going," Jeffrey said.
Hitchcock worked with Jeffrey to develop a multi-year program that would provide both research and teaching opportunities for students and faculty at the University.
"The idea was that, by funding the start up of the center over a period of years, it would allow time for the group to become independent by obtaining funding and grants from other sources, especially funding sources that are not usually available to researchers in single, independent laboratories," Hitchcock said.
In 2018, the Hitchcock Center officially opened as an interdisciplinary research unit, where graduate students could be trained to think in more disciplines than the normal higher education model allows for. The Hitchcock Center has developed a space where the lines are blurred between chemistry, biology and ecology.
Researchers study systems in Nevada’s dry, harsh deserts and the Amazon’s lush, tropical rainforests. One major project studies Piper kelleyi, a wild relative of black pepper. The plant, found in the Ecuadorian and Peruvian Andes, is widespread and supports many species, particularly caterpillars. The project involves collaboration with the Indigenous Kichwa and Waorani communities in Ecuador. These communities have used Piper as medicine for generations. The research project includes Lora Richards (Principal Investigator), Deena Schmidt, Thomas Parchman, Lee Dyer, Christopher Jeffrey, Craig Dodson and Casey Philbin (all faculty from the University), and scientists from the Kichwa and Waorani communities.
A recent National Science Foundation (NSF) Research Traineeship (NRT) grant was awarded to the Hitchcock Center after seven previous applications for the incredibly competitive grant.
The $3 million grant will support at least 25 fellowships for students working in chemical ecology. Jeffrey credits the success of the proposal to Marjorie Matoq, the director of the Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Biology graduate program, whose experience with monitoring program success, a critical part of any grant, was the last piece of the puzzle to secure this achievement.
"Those missing elements pushed us right over the top," Jeffrey said.
The proposal featured several areas of research, including evolution of chemically mediated interactions, chemistry of community interactions, chemistry of biological interactions: engines of biodiversity, and ecoimmunology and pest management. The NRT funding also includes support for the development of a new course: Chemistry of Biological Interactions.
The center promotes success for graduate students by providing a workshop series that will discuss topics like interdisciplinary communication, conflict resolutions, DEI/Ally training, team science and reproducible science. The NSF has emphasized the importance of making science reproducible and developing good data management practices.
"That grant, I would say, reflects the broader goals of our center," Jeffrey said.
To promote interdisciplinary research partnerships, the Hitchcock Center pairs two students on a single project who are participating in distinct areas of research. Zach Ledvina and Haley Dole are partnering up to teach each other the chemical and ecological characteristics of Piper kelleyi. Ledvina, a chemistry student pursuing his doctoral degree, and Dole, a doctoral student in the Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Biology graduate program, each have unique skillsets and knowledge about the system that they can share with one another to elucidate the underlying "chemical happenings" in the system.
The center also provides stipends and research support for undergraduate students, and summer or semester internships with the biotechnology industry, natural resource management agencies, outreach education (including at the University’s Museum of Natural History) and conservation organizations.
The Hitchcock Center just hosted its second Hitchcock Symposium at the 推荐杏吧原创 at Lake Tahoe, which brought a long-time supporter and advisory member of the center, Paul Alan Cox, back to campus. Cox is an ethnobotanist who searches for cures or treatments for diseases in the natural world, particularly in so-called "blue zones" where much of the population lives longer than the average human lifespan. Cox previously spoke at the University for a Discover Science lecture in 2016 and continues to advocate for the center through support on grants and as an adviser to the programs.
"You’ve got the right people, the right science, the right questions," Cox said about the Hitchcock Center during his talk.
The center received funding from multiple companies to support the symposium, including Untamed Wine Estates, where alumna McKenzie Shipman-Sanvido '15 (biology, analytical chemistry) serves as vice president, which provided raffle prizes for public attendees; Agilent, a company that develops cutting edge instrumentation, which provided academic and speaker grants; and Alcami, which provided award sponsorship for student presentations.
In addition to the Hitchcock Center, Jeffrey said there are several other chemical ecology centers around the world, including at the Pennsylvania State University, Cornell University, Georgia Institute of Technology and the Max Planck Institute in Germany.
"What makes our program unique is that it is chemistry-forward," Jeffrey said.
The Hitchcock Center was recently elected to a multi-state consortium of chemical ecology centers led by Penn State and Cornell focused on using chemical ecology to solve agricultural challenges. This election has elevated the center’s status as an internationally recognized contributor to the discipline and paved the way for the center to apply for new agriculture grants. Jeffrey recently attended the International Chemical Ecology short course, which rotates between most of the major centers for chemical ecology. Jeffrey is working out dates with his colleagues for the Hitchcock Center to host this short course in the future. The Hitchcock Center has also been developing partnerships with other universities to work toward applied research in agriculture and medicine.
One part of the many projects Jeffrey is excited about is the synthetic chemistry being used to understand the relationships between caterpillars and Piper kelleyi. As a synthetic chemist, Jeffrey, who had just finished his postdoctoral work, read an article published in 2007 that said the field was facing the slow death of natural products chemistry. Today, Jeffrey is excited that natural products and synthetic chemistry are going hand-in-hand, playing an important role in chemical ecology research, and are able to directly address some of the biggest questions in science, such as explaining the biodiversity of our planet.
Since the Hitchcock Center was formally recognized on campus, faculty and the center itself have received $30 million in grants, comprised of four NSF grants (including the NRT and Piper kelleyi research), a NASA astrobiology research grant (in partnership with scientists at the Desert Research Institute) and others.
Scott Chadwick of Alcami has also supported the center by endowing a scholarship for an outstanding graduate student in chemical ecology.
"My goal for the center is that it will eventually take on a life of its own," Hitchcock said. "Much like seed funding for an entrepreneurial business venture, the strategy is to start the ball rolling with enough energy to allow it to continue independently in due course."
