Erica McAlister - 4.00pm - On a panel with Chris Lintott hosted by Robin Ince

ERICA MCALISTER

Erica is the Senior Curator for Diptera and Siphonaptera, and manages the lower Brachycera, Mycetophilidae and Culicidae collections in Diptera, and the Siphonaptera collection.

Her specific interests lie within Diptera especially Culicidae, Asilidae, and Mycetophilidae. She has carried out many research projects with mosquitoes including contract work for the MoD in Tajikistan alongside Dr Ralph Harbach where they were involved in the training of mosquito identification and malaria incrimination over a three-year project. She is also involved in UK Mosquito projects which have included incriminating for viruses and are currently undertaking on an historic DNA recovery project with Dr Mara Lawniczak, from the Sanger Wellcome Institue .

She is involved in an ongoing Asilidae taxonomy research project and am currently working on a large revision of Australian species with an external Collaborator.

She has been working with Operation Wallacea since 2015 out in Dominica, teaching entomology and studying the invertebrate, specifically Dipteran fauna of the Island.

As well as my profession commitments she is very much involved in public engagement both within the museum and externally and in 2019 she gave the opening plenary lecture at the Entomological Society of America's Annual Conference. Within the Museum, she has participated in Nature Lives, Nigh Safaris, and both children’s and Adult dinosnores.

Externally shehas presented two Radio 4 series on Insects (Who's the Pest https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01r6hzzand Metamorphosishttps://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000sql2) as well as appearing in many others (Radio 3, 4 and BBC London) including the Life Scientific, Nature Table and the Infinite Monkey Cage. She has presented talks to Natural History Societies, giving talks for Cafe Scientific, Pub Science, a Summer Lecture for the Royal Society, and also Ratio (Bulgaria). As well as these she has  participated in Ugly Animals, Science Showoff and Museum Showoff.

She published an award winning popular science book titled ‘The Secret life of Flies’ in 2017 and published a follow up 'The Inside Out of Flies' in 2020