Cellular Dialogues in the Holobiont (PDF)

Michael G. Hadfield received B.A. and M.S. degrees in Zoology from the University of Washington and then spent a year as a Fulbright Fellow studying larval biology at the Marine Biological Laboratory of the University of Copenhagen. He received a Ph.D. in Biological Sciences at Stanford University presenting a dissertation on the reproduction and development of marine gastropods, a study that involved field research, laboratory observations and experiments, and electron microscopy. After spending two years teaching at Pomona College in southern California, he joined the faculty at the Kewalo Marine Laboratory of the University of Hawaii. His research has focused on development of marine invertebrate animals, especially the complex processes of larval metamorphosis and the factors that stimulate metamorphosis. For the last 20 years, these studies have increasingly focused on the mechanisms by which specific biofilm bacterial species stimulate larval settlement and metamorphosis and the larval responses to those stimuli. Now Professor of Biology Emeritus, he continues to direct an active research group at the Kewalo Marine Lab of the Pacific Biosciences Research Center. He has trained 10 M.S. and 21 Ph.D. students and a large number of postdoctoral fellows. He has also served since 1999 as director of an undergraduate research-mentoring program for Hawaiian and Pacific Island students, with support for the National Science Foundation. In addition to his research interests in the development of marine invertebrate animals, Dr. Hadfield has maintained a separate research program focused on the evolutionary biology and conservation of endangered Hawaiian and Marianas Islands tree snails. Dr. Hadfield has served as Director of the Kewalo Marine Lab, Chair of the Hawaii Natural Areas Reserves Commission, President of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology and the Western Society of Naturalists, and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Research in the Hadfield lab has been supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, the Office of Naval Research, the Oak Foundation, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in the last decade.