Commissioners

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Dr. Judith E. Winston

 

Overview

Judith Winston’s main research focus is on the phylum Bryozoa: systematics, ecology, and evolution. Much of her work has involved basic descriptive studies of species and higher taxa, copiously illustrated by SEM images. For bryozoans, as for most marine invertebrates, the numbers of unknown to named species (about 5,000) is very high, and vast regions of the world’s coasts, continental shelves, and ocean floors remain unsurveyed. She has carried out field work at sites from Alaska to Antarctica, but is especially interested in the bryozoan fauna and biogeography of the tropical western Atlantic. Her other research interests include marine biodiversity conservation, history of invertebrate zoology, and not suprisingly, taxonomic procedure and nomenclature. She has published a desk reference textbook, Describing Species: Practical Taxonomic Procedure for Biologists.

 

Summary of Research and Education

Judith Winston received her PhD in 1974 from the Department of Geophysical Sciences at The University of Chicago. After a postdoctoral fellowship at the Smithsonian Marine Station and NHMH, she worked on cryptic reef bryozoan ecology at the Johns Hopkins University and Discovery Bay Marine Laboratory, Jamaica, W. I., where her research was funded by NSF grants. In 1980 she became an assistant curator in the Department of Invertebrates at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City where she progressed to full curator and department chairperson.  In 1992 she moved to the Virginia Museum of Natural History where she served as research director (1992-2002), interim director, (2003-4) and curator of marine biology (2004-present).  Dr Winston is a past president of the American Microscopical Society (2007), a board member of the Natural Science Collections Alliance (2003-9) and is currently president of the International Bryozoology Association.  She has been part of a GBIF project on an e-catalog of bryozoan names, and is working with an international group of bryozoan taxonomists toward making bryozoans part of the EOL and other online iniatives.

 

Contact details:

Dr. Judith E. Winston
Curator of Marine Biology
Virginia Museum of Natural History
21 Starling Avenue
Martinsville, VA 24112 USA

Telephone  276-634-4175
E-mail: judith.winston (at) vmnh.virginia.gov