Anna J. Phillips is an American Research Zoologist and curator of

Clitellata The Clitellata are a class of annelid worms, characterized by having a clitellum – the 'collar' that forms a reproductive cocoon during part of their life cycles. The clitellates comprise around 8,000 species. Unlike the class of Polychaeta ...

and

Cestoda Cestoda is a class of parasitic worms in the flatworm phylum (Platyhelminthes). Most of the species—and the best-known—are those in the subclass Eucestoda; they are ribbon-like worms as adults, commonly known as tapeworms. Their bodies co ...

at the

National Museum of Natural History The National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. With 4.4 ...

's Department of Invertebrate Zoology. As a

parasitologist Parasitology is the study of parasites, their hosts, and the relationship between them. As a biological discipline, the scope of parasitology is not determined by the organism or environment in question but by their way of life. This means it f ...

her research focuses on

leeches Leeches are segmented parasitic or predatory worms that comprise the subclass Hirudinea within the phylum Annelida. They are closely related to the oligochaetes, which include the earthworm, and like them have soft, muscular segmented bod ...

and

tapeworms Cestoda is a class of parasitic worms in the flatworm phylum (Platyhelminthes). Most of the species—and the best-known—are those in the subclass Eucestoda; they are ribbon-like worms as adults, commonly known as tapeworms. Their bodies con ...

, by studying their diversity, relationships, and host associations. She has traveled all over the world with her fieldwork to study the diversity of these invertebrates on a long range.

Biography

Phillips grew up in North Carolina spending much of her time outdoors. She and her family would go camping, hiking, and other outdoor activities. Each year they would visit the

Great Smoky Mountains National Park Great Smoky Mountains National Park is a List of national parks of the United States, national park of the United States in the southeastern United States, southeast, with parts in North Carolina and Tennessee. The park straddles the ridgeline o ...

. Out of all this she became interested in wildlife, even the smaller organisms that were not noticed by many. These experiences led to her research in invertebrate biology, focusing on parasitology. She graduated with a BS in Biology with a concentration in ecology and evolutionary biology from

Appalachian State University Appalachian State University (), or App State, is a Public university, public research university in Boone, North Carolina, United States. It was founded as a normal school, teachers' college in 1899 by brothers B. B. and D. D. Dougherty and th ...

in 2006 with university honors. She received her PhD in Biology from the

Graduate Center of the City University of New York The Graduate School and University Center of the City University of New York (CUNY Graduate Center) is a public research institution and postgraduate university in New York City. Formed in 1961 as Division of Graduate Studies at City University ...

in 2011. She then worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the

University of Connecticut The University of Connecticut (UConn) is a public land-grant research university system with its main campus in Storrs, Connecticut, United States. It was founded in 1881 as the Storrs Agricultural School, named after two benefactors. In 1893, ...

in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. In 2013, she became a research zoologist and curator at the National Museum of Natural History in the Department of Invertebrate Zoology. Grania sp Chile

Phillips helped oversee the transfer of the United States National Parasite Collection to the Natural History Museum. About 20 million specimens were moved. They are now sorting through the specimens to organize and maintain the collections. Some of the collection are older and must be maintained in a different way now to keep them in good condition. Phillips has traveled to six of the seven continents for her fieldwork. She collects specimens to describe new species and find out evolutionary connections of the worms, while also using morphological and molecular data. She also looks into host-parasite relationships to figure out how they changed their evolution. She has been focusing her host-parasite interactions research on non-marine bird tapeworms.

Select publications

*AJ Phillips, ME Siddall. 2009. Poly-paraphyly of Hirudinidae: many lineages of medicinal leeches. BMC evolutionary biology 9 (1), page 246. https://bmcevolbiol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2148-9-246. *AJ Phillips, R Arauco-Brown, A Oceguera-Figueroa, GP Gomez, M Beltrán, YT Lai, ME Siddall. 2010. Tyrannobdella rex n. gen. n. sp. and the evolutionary origins of mucosal leech infestations. PLoS One 5 (4), e10057. http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0010057. *A Oceguera-Figueroa, AJ Phillips, B Pacheco-Chaves, WK Reeves, ME Siddall. 2011. Phylogeny of macrophagous leeches (Hirudinea, Clitellata) based on molecular data and evaluation of the barcoding locus. Zoologica Scripta 40 (2), pages 194-203. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1463-6409.2010.00465.x. *ME Siddall, GS Min, FM Fontanella, AJ Phillips, SC Watson. 2011. Bacterial symbiont and salivary peptide evolution in the context of leech phylogeny. Parasitology 138, 1815-1827. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Anna_Phillips7/publication/51467444_Bacterial_symbiont_and_salivary_peptide_evolution_in_the_context_of_leech_phylogeny/links/0046352b346d3b8b51000000/Bacterial-symbiont-and-salivary-peptide-evolution-in-the-context-of-leech-phylogeny.pdf. *AJ Phillips, ME Siddall. 2005. Phylogeny of the new world medicinal leech family macrobdellidae (Oligochaeta: Hirudinida: Arhynchobdellida). Zoologica Scripta 34 (6), 559-564. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1463-6409.2005.00210.x. * ME Siddall, S Kvist, A Phillips, A Oceguera-Figuero. 2012. DNA barcoding of parasitic nematodes: is it kosher?. Journal of Parasitology 98 (3), pages 692-694. https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/41511264.pdf. *CJ Carlson, KR Burgio, ER Dougherty, AJ Phillips, VM Bueno, CF Clements, G Castaldo, TA Dallas, CA Cizauskas, GS Cumming, J Doña, NC Harris, R Jovani, S Mironov, OC Muellerklein, HC Proctor, WM Getz. 2017. Parasite biodiversity faces extinction and redistribution in a changing climate. Science Advances 3 (9), e1602422. https://www.science.org/doi/pdf/10.1126/sciadv.1602422. *CA Cizauskas, CJ Carlson, KR Burgio, CF Clements, ER Dougherty, NC Harris, AJ Phillips. 2017. Parasite vulnerability to climate change: an evidence-based functional trait approach. Royal Society open science 4 (1), 160535. http://rsos.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/4/1/160535. *J Mariaux, VV Tkach, GP Vasileva, A Waeschenbach, I Beveridge, YD Dimitrova, V Haukisalmi, SE Greiman, DTJ Littlewood, AA Makarikov, AJ Phillips, T Razafiarisolo, V Widmer, BB Georgiev. 2017. Cyclophyllidea van Beneden in Braun, 1900. Planetary Biodiversity Inventory (2008–2017): Tapeworms from Vertebrate Bowels of the Earth pages 77-148. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/DTJ_Littlewood/publication/319136900_Cyclophyllidea_van_Beneden_in_Braun_1900/links/599426a60f7e9b98953ad5af/Cyclophyllidea-van-Beneden-in-Braun-1900.pdf. *R Salas-Montiel, AJ Phillips, GPP De Leon, A Oceguera-Figueroa. 2014. Description of a new leech species of Helobdella (Clitellata: Glossiphoniidae) from Mexico with a review of Mexican congeners and a taxonomic key. Zootaxa 3900 (1), pages 77-94. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Gerardo_Leon4/publication/270221927_Description_of_a_new_leech_species_of_Helobdella_Clitellata_Glossiphoniidae_from_Mexico_with_a_review_of_Mexican_congeners_and_a_taxonomic_key/links/54b005ef0cf2431d3531d18c.pdf.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Phillips, Anna J. Year of birth missing (living people) Living people 21st-century American scientists 21st-century American women scientists 21st-century American non-fiction writers 21st-century American women writers Smithsonian Institution people CUNY Graduate Center alumni Appalachian State University alumni