It's all in the family-the departmental family.

When Walter Leal, professor and chair of the University of California, Davis Department of Entomology, recently delivered the Geoffrey G. E. Scudder Lecture in Entomology at the University of British Columbia, he became part of a legacy of excellence that stretches between Vancouver, B.C. and Davis and beyond.

The Scudder/UC Davis connection:

. UC Davis entomology professor Penny Gullan, who specializes in systematic entomology, received the Scudder Lecture award in 2003.
. The late Sean Duffey, who served as a professor of entomology at UC Davis until his death in 1997, studied under Scudder.
. And, one of Duffey's doctoral students, Murray Isman, today serves as the dean of the Faculty of Land and Food Systems at the University of British Columbia.

"So, it's come full circle," Leal said.

"Murray Isman is just one of our UC Davis-trained students to hold top academic positions at universities throughout the world," Leal said. "No other entomology department in the country has generated more faculty members at the nation's universities than our department-53 in 25 universities."

Among the UC Davis alumni: Gary Felton serves as head of the entomology department at Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pa., and Kevin Heinz serves as head of the entomology department at Texas A & M, College Station, Texas. Heinz received his doctorate in entomology under the supervision of Michael Parrella, now associate dean of agricultural sciences at the UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences and professor of entomology and environmental horticulture.

"The UC Davis Department of Entomology is known for training its students well," Leal said.

At the Scudder Lecture, Leal spoke on "Bug's Life in the Fast Lane: Rapid Binding, Release and Inactivation of Pheromones." A chemical ecologist, Leal is internationally known for his research on the molecular basis of insect olfaction, or how insects detect smells and communicate within their species.

He was presented a hand-carved wood wall sculpture of a beaver, signifying industriousness and building skills. The unique sculpture is the work of artist Jim Yelton of the Lattimer Gallery, Vancouver, B.C.

Scudder, a global expert on the systematics of seed bugs and a zoologist, served as head of the Department of Zoology at the University of British Columbia and as interim director of the Centre for Biodiversity Research before his retirement. He launched the Scudder Lecture in Entomology in 2001.


Scudder's former student, Sean Duffey (1943-1997) worked on the same floor of Briggs Hall that Walter Leal and other entomology faculty members now do. A native of Toronto, Duffey received his bachelor's and master's degrees in zoology and his Ph.D. in botany from the University of British Columbia, the latter in 1974. He joined the UC Davis faculty in 1976, and like Leal, focused on chemical ecology.