Artwork by Misha Plagwitz

Welcome to the Koop Lab!

Species interactions play a pivotal role in driving and maintaining biodiversity.  Parasites, one of the most diverse groups of organisms on Earth, dominate food web links in ecosystems, drive speciation of hosts through antagonistic interactions, and can even cause local extinction of hosts.  Tradeoffs in virulence and transmission dynamics alter the impact of parasites on hosts.  Complex interactions between hosts and parasites can affect the evolutionary trajectory of entire communities. The ability to predict how parasites will affect hosts across spatial and temporal scales is important from both scientific and conservation perspectives. My research group in the Department of Biological Sciences at Northern Illinois University studies the ecology and evolution of host-parasite interactions.

Interested in joining the Koop lab? If you are interested in learning more about the lab, please contact me at jkoop [@] niu [dot] edu.  If you are an undergraduate interested in joining the lab, please send me a brief statement of your research interests and how they relate to my lab, your current GPA, and your undergraduate major.  If you are a potential graduate student interested in joining the lab, please provide me with your CV including a list of relevant coursework, a writing sample, and a brief statement of your research interests. You can learn more about the graduate programs available at NIU by visiting the following website.  ***Please note that at this time, I am only accepting PhD students and Postdocs***