Jessica Lee Ware is a Canadian-American evolutionary biologist and

entomologist Entomology () is the scientific study of insects, a branch of zoology. In the past the term "insect" was less specific, and historically the definition of entomology would also include the study of animals in other arthropod groups, such as arach ...

. She is the associate curator of invertebrate zoology at the

American Museum of Natural History The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. In addition, she is a principal investigator at the Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics and an associate professor for the

Richard Gilder Graduate School The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...

. Ware has served as president of the

Entomological Society of America The Entomological Society of America (ESA) was founded in 1889 and today has more than 7,000 members, including educators, extension personnel, consultants, students, researchers, and scientists from agricultural departments, health agencies, ...

, and as President of the Worldwide Dragonfly Association. She studies the evolution of insect physiology and behavior, particularly dragonflies and

dictyoptera Dictyoptera (from Greek δίκτυον ''diktyon'' "net" and πτερόν ''pteron'' "wing") is an insect superorder that includes two extant orders of polyneopterous insects: the order Blattodea (termites and cockroaches together) and the ord ...

, as well as their

biogeography Biogeography is the study of the distribution of species and ecosystems in geographic space and through geological time. Organisms and biological communities often vary in a regular fashion along geographic gradients of latitude, elevation, ...

(geographic distribution). Ware was a contributor to a major study of the

phylogenomics Phylogenomics is the intersection of the fields of evolution and genomics. The term has been used in multiple ways to refer to analysis that involves genome data and evolutionary reconstructions. It is a group of techniques within the larger field ...

of insect evolution, and developed molecular

phylogeny A phylogenetic tree (also phylogeny or evolutionary tree Felsenstein J. (2004). ''Inferring Phylogenies'' Sinauer Associates: Sunderland, MA.) is a branching diagram or a tree showing the evolutionary relationships among various biological spec ...

hexapoda The subphylum Hexapoda (from Greek for 'six legs') comprises most species of arthropods and includes the insects as well as three much smaller groups of wingless arthropods: Collembola, Protura, and Diplura (all of these were once considered inse ...

. Ware warns of the dangerous losses occurring in insect taxonomies, which are being reported as high as 80%.

Early life and education

Jessica Lee Ware was born in 1977 in Montreal, Quebec, and has a twin brother, artist and activist

Syrus Marcus Ware Syrus Marcus Ware is a Canadian artist, activist and scholar. He lives and works in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and is an assistant professor in the school of the arts at McMaster University. He has worked since 2014 as faculty and as a designer f ...

. Ware has said that she became interested in biology because her grandparents, Gwen and Harold Irons, in northern Canada encouraged her to collect snakes, insects, and frogs. Ware attended the University of Toronto Schools (UTS) for grades 7–13. Ware earned a Bachelor of Science in invertebrate zoology from the

University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a public university, public research university with campuses near Vancouver and in Kelowna, British Columbia. Established in 1908, it is British Columbia's oldest university. The university ranks a ...

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

in 2001. She pursued entomology after a work-study position at the Spencer Entomological Museum at UBC, which helped to support her during her studies. After graduating, Ware traveled to Costa Rica to work with Diane Srivastava for a semester. She reports that her time in Costa Rica inspired her to pursue research as a career, and it was also her first experience of working with other scientists of color. Ware went directly from her bachelor's degree to the doctoral program at

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's ...

.She was awarded a PhD in 2008, with a dissertation titled, ''Molecular and morphological systematics of Libelluloidea (Odonata: Anisoptera) and Dictyoptera'', an examination of the evolutionary history of the ''

Libelluloidea Libelluloidea is a superfamily of dragonflies. A 2007 phylogenetic analysis suggests that this superfamily contains four families:Ware, J., May, M., & Kjer, K. (2007)Phylogeny of the higher Libelluloidea (Anisoptera: Odonata): an exploration of ...

'' superfamily of dragonflies.

Career

In 2010, Ware became an assistant professor at Rutgers University, and was granted tenure in 2016. In 2020 she was hired as an assistant curator of Odonata & non- holometabolous insect orders at the

(AMNH) in Manhattan, New York, later becoming associate curator. She is helping to develop the Susan and Peter J. Solomon Family Insectarium at AMNH, which will explore the diversity and importance of insect orders. Ware is also a research associate at the

National Museum of Natural History The National Museum of Natural History 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. In 2021, with 7 ...

in Washington, D.C. Ware contributed to a major study of the

of insect evolution, and developed molecular

. She has undertaken fieldwork in several continents. Ware is active in encouraging women and people from under-represented groups to become entomologists. She was a featured speaker at the March for Science in Washington DC in 2017. She co-founded Entomologists of Color
www.entopoc.org
and co-organized #BlackInEnto week in February 2021. She is a contributor to ''Entomology Today'', and serves on the board of several entomological journals. Ware has served on the Governing Board of the

, representing the SysEB section. As of May 7, 2020, Ware was elected to become Vice President-Elect of the

, starting her term as vice president in November 2020, and as president in November 2021. From 2019 to 2021, she served as President of the Worldwide Dragonfly Association. She has been on NOVA PBS shows about insect entomophagy, and butterflies. She has also been featured on

Jonathan Van Ness Jonathan McDonald Van Ness (born March 28, 1987), also commonly referred to by his initials JVN, is an American hairstylist, podcast host and television personality. He is best known as the grooming expert on the Netflix series '' Queer Eye'', ...

's podcast '' Getting Curious''.

Honors

* 2022, Fellow,

California Academy of Sciences The California Academy of Sciences is a research institute and natural history museum in San Francisco, California, that is among the largest museums of natural history in the world, housing over 46 million specimens. The Academy began in 1853 ...

* 2019, Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers ( PECASE) award, U.S. Government * 2019, Leader in Faculty Diversity Award, Rutgers University, which "honors a select number of faculty who have been leaders in promoting diversity, inclusion, equity, and access at Rutgers, either through their own academic research, teaching, community engagement research, and other forms of engagement". *2017, SysEB Snodgrass Memorial Research Award,

which recognizes "outstanding research by a graduate student". * 2015, NSF Early CAREER Award, National Science Foundation * 2008, John Henry Comstock Graduate Student Award,

Personal life

Ware's maternal family is from England but they have lived in Canada since the early 20th century. Ware's paternal family are from the southern United States. Ware has dual citizenship. Ware was married to another entomologist, however, they are now separated and she is a single parent to two children. Ware identifies as bisexual.

References

External links

Biography
at Rutgers University {{DEFAULTSORT:Ware, Jessica 1977 births 21st-century African-American academics 21st-century African-American scientists 21st-century African-American women 21st-century American academics 21st-century American biologists 21st-century American LGBT people 21st-century American women scientists 21st-century Canadian biologists 21st-century Canadian LGBT people 21st-century Canadian women scientists African-American women scientists American bisexual women American entomologists American LGBT academics American LGBT scientists American twins American women academics American women biologists Black Canadian LGBT people Black Canadian scientists Black Canadian women Bisexual scientists Canadian bisexual women Canadian entomologists Canadian LGBT academics Canadian LGBT scientists Canadian twins Canadian women academics Canadian women biologists Evolutionary biologists African-American LGBT people Living people Odonatologists People associated with the American Museum of Natural History Presidents of the Entomological Society of America Rutgers University alumni Rutgers University faculty Scientists from Montreal University of British Columbia Faculty of Science alumni Women entomologists Women evolutionary biologists