Legacy Committee

The Legacy Committee mission is to gather historical information on the Society of Systematic Biologists [note it is not the Society of Systematic Biology], and to ensure that our Legacy going forward becomes more diverse by collaborating with the DEI committee. We are also charged with reviewing the SSB website and making suggestions for improvement.  In creating the first “Legacy Committee”, Chris Simon invited two early career systematists (Michael Landis and Rosana Zenil Fergusson), two mid-career systematists (Tracy Heath and Stacey Smith), and two veteran systematists (Jim Rohlf and Gary Schnell).

Legacy Committee Chair: Dr. Chris Simon

Committee members include:
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Michael Landis is an assistant professor in the Department of Biology at Washington University in St. Louis. His group studies how evolutionary, ecological, environmental, and geographical dynamics interact over time to generate patterns of biodiversity, largely through the design and application of new statistical phylogenetic models and inference methods.
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​Stacey D. Smith is an associate professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado-Boulder and long-time member of SSB. Broadly, her lab studies plant trait evolution using comparative, morphological, biochemical and genomic approaches. She is a proud Solanalogist (one who studies the tomato family), and much of her work involves the evolution of colorful flowers in this fascinating group of plants. 

​Jim Rohlf is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus and Research Professor in the Dept. of Anthropology at Stony Brook University. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He is interested in the applications of mathematical methods and statistics (especially multivariate statistics) to problems in biology with emphasis on morphometrics and the theory of systematics. Recent research has been concerned with the relatively new field of geometric morphometrics - using statistics to study variation in the shapes of biological structures its covariation with other variables. Recent publications have included  statistical theory, and applications to optic neuropathy in humans.

Chris Simon is a Research Professor at the University of Connecticut. She is an honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand, past Fulbright Fellow, and past Editor, Associate Editor for Systematic Biology and past President, Executive VP, and Program Director of SSB. She has served on various SSB committees in the past including nominations, membership, long range planning and Ernst Mayr award. She was VP of SSE and on the nominations committee for SSE, and SMBE. She organized the evolution meetings in Hawaii in 1991. Her research focuses on phylogenomics, biogeography and evolution of cicadas and their bacterial and fungal endosymbionts. She has a particular fondness for natural history.

Rosana Zenil-Ferguson is an Assistant Professor at the University of Kentucky originally from Toluca, Mexico. Her lab develops new phylogenetic comparative models to solve key questions of plant macroevolution. Her main focus is to understand how plant traits evolve and how those traits link to the diversification patterns observed in the tree of life. She has been involved as a member of the Society of Systematic Biologists since 2014 and she is the first Latina to win the Ernst Mayr Award for an outstanding graduate student talk in the field of systematics during the Evolution 2017 meeting.

​Gary D. Schnell, who now lives in the Allentown, Pennsylvania area, is a Professor Emeritus of Biology and Curator Emeritus of Birds in the Department of Biology and the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History at the University of Oklahoma. Gary is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences and the American Ornithological Society. His earlier work in systematics involved systematics of gulls, terns, skimmers, and skuas. More recent research has focused on ecology of mammals, birds, and insects. He has applied statistical techniques to a range of research problems in systematics and ecology.  Research has included ecology of bats and a variety of small mammals in the state of Colima, Mexico. In Oklahoma and Arkansas, he conducted detailed studies of the American burying beetle, an endangered species that is now listed as threatened.  In the Society of Systematic Biology, Gary served at various times as Assistant Editor, Managing Editor, and Editor of Systematic Zoology (now Systematic Biology).

Tracy Heath is an Associate Professor at Iowa State University where she also serves as the Professor-in-Charge of the George Washington Carver Scholarship Program. Research in her lab focuses on the development of statistical models and methods for inferring phylogenies and macroevolutionary processes. This work additionally involves software development and members of the Heath lab are core developers for the program RevBayes. Tracy has been a member of SSB since 2002 and has served as a general council member (2013-2015), Awards Director (2016-2018), Communications Director (2019-2021), and SSB representative on the Joint Meeting Council (2024).