Discovery and insight require time and commitment. Launched in 2020, the Maxwell/Hanrahan Awards in Field Biology are designed to recognize and encourage under-appreciated, early or critical career stage talent and curiosity in field-based research. The awards support individual scientists, elevate their diverse perspectives and enable them to commit time to the observation and experimentation that help us better understand ourselves and the world around us.
Each year, we aim to give five awards. These are one-time, unrestricted awards, intended to provide people with funding, attention and support. To be eligible, candidates must be early career or at a career junction, and conducting innovative field biology research through hands-on fieldwork. Self-nominations are not allowed. Nominators confidentially identified scientists for the awards and a committee selected winners based on impact and originality of their research, and the momentum an award could provide at a critical career point.
Read the full press release announcing the 2023 awards here.
Learn more about the 2023 winners and their work below, and read more details about each winner from all four cohorts on our blog. You may also click here to view videos of past winners and their field work.
2023 Field Biology Award Winners
Agnes Dellinger
Agnes Dellinger’s research helps us understand how flowers diversify to adapt to different pollinators.
Astrid Leitner
Oceanographer Astrid Leitner researches the ecology and behavior of marine animals around steep seafloor features in the deep ocean, home to the largest communities of animals on earth.
Norine Yeung
Norine Yeung is a snail researcher studying taxonomy, ecology, evolution and conservation of Pacific Island land snails. She and her colleagues have re-discovered more than 200 species of Hawaiian land snails thought to be extinct.
Paulina L. González-Gómez
Paulina L. González-Gómez’s work focuses on how environmental variability shapes the integration of gene expression patterns, behavior, physiology and life history of birds.
Sahas Barve
Sahas Barve is an evolutionary ecologist and leads a long-term field-based study on the social behavior of threatened Florida Scrub-Jays.
2020 winner Mrinalini Erkenswick Watsa in the field. (Photo: Ryan Peters)
Why Field Biology?
The Foundation decided to focus on field biology because of the founders’ interests and experiences. While a graduate student in Wisconsin, Pat Hanrahan’s professors and colleagues introduced him to the power of exploration in field biology–and despite following a different career path, work with invertebrates and bacteria continues to intrigue him. Delle Maxwell grew up in an environment where science and fieldwork were intertwined. Her father was oceanographer Arthur Maxwell, who conducted research on ocean geothermal measurements. Close family friends included Delle’s sibling Rick in their summer vacation research adventures searching the western U.S. for Paleozoic brachiopods. The intellectual challenge associated with outdoor exploration continues to inspire her. For more about the founders’ interests in field biology, see Delle’s blog post.