February 4, 2005

I am a "Field Sales Engineer" for Noldus Information Technology. That title means I am a consultant, salesman, demonstrator, trainer, and technical support person — in short, I do anything that needs to be done for Noldus in the northeast (Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Hampshire, Maine, and Vermont). Noldus makes software for research in animal behavior, psychology, neuroscience, usability, ergonomics, and sports.

Up until I completed my doctorate in 2000, I was a graduate student in the Boston University Marine Program, based in the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. My advisor there wasJelle Atema, a sensory biologist. The lab studies chemosensory behavior, in particular in the American lobster Homarus americanus. In May, 2000, I finished and defended my doctoral thesis on the chemosensory search behavior of starfish.

My interest in starfish broadened the lab phylogenetically, but I drew upon the lab's experience in chemosensory biology. Others in the Atema lab have studied agonistic behavior in the lobster (and have identified behaviors that depend on chemical cues), mating behavior (again, involving chemical signals), and chemosensory search behavior. We observed animals in the lab and in the field (not as much as we'd like in the field, though), looked at behavior and physiological recordings, measured chemical concentrations at the scale of lobster chemosensory receptor structures in chemical plumes and even from the backs of moving lobsters, and modeled search strategies with a lobster-scaled robot we call the robster. Personally, I've been involved in experiments in lobster aggression and memory, characterization of flow in what we humbly call "the big flume" (12 meters long and 2 meters wide), and orientation experiments with the robster, in addition to my experiments with starfish.

Before coming to Woods Hole, I was an undergraduate marine biology major at the University Of California, Santa Cruz, where, to my good fortune, I had more than my fair share of marine and invertebrate courses. I graduated in 1993. Credit for much of my interest in starfish goes to my undergraduate advisor, Dr. John Pearse. Aside from my research interests, I also run a LARP, play and run pen-and-paper role-playing games, write fiction (fantasy and science fiction), dabble in various crafts, scuba dive, and pursue assorted and unpredictable other hobbies. Exploring these pages, you'll find more on most of these subjects. Have fun looking around.

—Jonathan

My old business card was too nifty to throw away (contact info is wrong, though):