CNPS Student Research Grant Recipients 2026

Supporting Students

Each year, CNPS awards grants to student researchers focused on California native plants. Supporting research, especially that of students, is crucial to the mission of CNPS. Learn about this year’s recipients below who are contributing to the understanding and conservation of our native flora! CNPS is proud to present this year’s grant recipients, and we wish to thank the generous donors who’ve made these grants possible.

Alexandra Cisneros Carey

Impact of species interactions on the population stability of a California native alpine plant

Alex is a second-year Ph.D student at UCLA, studying alpine plant communities and population dynamics in the White Mountains of California. She grew up in San Francisco, and graduated from UC Berkeley, where she took as many natural history and field classes as she could. After graduating, she worked at Sierra Streams Institute, an environmental non-profit in the Sierra Nevada foothills, as an AmeriCorps plant restoration volunteer, and eventually as data manager. She then joined a Bay Area consulting company as a junior botanist surveying the Southern Sierra and Humboldt County, before moving to Maine. For the next two years, she worked for Acadia National Park, researching mountain summit restoration practices and getting really into New England folk music. Her hobbies include reading, road-tripping around California with her friends, and contra and square dancing.

Ava Joseph

Systematics and alpine biogeography of Astragalus sect. Cusickiani

Ava is a first-year Ph.D. student in Botany at the California Botanic Garden/Claremont Graduate University. She is studying the evolutionary history of two sections of Astragalus (milkvetches), with the goals of clarifying relationships in this large and complicated genus and understanding montane and alpine species diversification. She hopes this research will provide a replicable workflow for future phylogenetic studies on Astragalus and inform conservation of vulnerable alpine populations. Ava received her B.S. in Genetics & Plant Biology from the University of California, Berkeley, where she spent most of her time at the botanical garden, herbaria, or Point Reyes. Her other interests include visiting museums, sitting on the beach, and supporting walkable city infrastructure.

Bucky Squier

Hummingbird Gardens or Hummingbird Deserts: Comparing Nectar provided by California's Native Plant Species and Their Cultivars as Hummingbird Resources

Bucky is a second year PhD Student in the UC Davis Graduate Group in Ecology. Growing up in the Sacramento Valley sparked his interests in nature. Pursuing his passions for the natural world he received a Bachelors in Environmental Science and Conservation Biology from UCLA in 2023. After undergrad, he started working at the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory where he studied plant demography and pollination syndromes in alpine meadows. At UC Davis, he researches the impacts of global change drivers on plant-pollinator networks and floral resources of insect and avian pollinators. In his free time, Bucky enjoys making stained glass art inspired by nature.

Catherine Ogoma

Shaping Survival: Leaf Shape as a Mechanism of Adaptation in Extreme Environments

I am a fourth-year PhD candidate in the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology (EBIO) Department at Tulane University. My research focuses on the genetic and ecological basis of leaf shape evolution in Mimulus (monkeyflowers). I am particularly interested in understanding how traits like leaf lobing contribute to adaptation and plant performance in extreme environments, such as rocky outcrops. My work combines field experiments, greenhouse studies, and quantitative genetics to link phenotype, fitness, and environment. What excites me most about my research is the opportunity to empirically test adaptive hypotheses in natural systems. Outside of research, I enjoy exploratory travel, hiking, exploring native plant communities, and sharing my enthusiasm for biology through teaching and outreach.

Cecilia Girvin

Floral longevity and male fitness in a hermaphroditic plant

Cecilia graduated form Cal Poly SLO in 2020 with a degree in Biology where she took as many plant classes as she could. She has worked on projects in dune ecosystems on the Oregon coast, seed functional traits in Oklahoma, and tropical plant evolution in Peru and Costa Rica. Now, she is a fourth-year PhD candidate in Dr. Kathleen Kay's plant evolution lab at UCSC in the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology department. Cecilia is fascinated by the vast diversity of plant reproductive systems, and her research aims to illuminate the role of conflicting selection via sexual function in floral evolution. When she’s not thinking about plants, Cecilia enjoys reading fiction and surfing.

Chloe Novak

Floristics on the Frontlines of Extinction: A Vascular Flora of the Amargosa River Headwaters, Nye and Esmeralda Counties, Nevada

Chloe is a masters student at the California Botanic Garden specializing in floristics and plant conservation in the Mojave and Great Basin deserts. With a background in political science, her botanical research and applied conservation interests are informed by the historical and political contexts that influence the diversity, abundance and distribution of plants, from colonization to climate change. She received her BA in political science from Reed College in Portland, OR and studied natural history and resource management at Merritt College in Oakland, CA to augment a wide range of volunteer and professional field botany experiences throughout western North America prior to joining the CalBG graduate program. She is currently conducting a floristic study of the headwaters of the Amargosa River in Nye and Esmeralda counties, Nevada—an area with rich biogeographic influences but little historical documentation of its flora that is facing unprecedented conservation threats from large-scale mining and other extractive industries.

Edith Lai

Powdery Mildew Prevalence and Control in Complex Plant Communities

Edith is a 4th year PhD student in the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology department at UC Santa Cruz. She comes from UC Berkeley with a background in disease ecology and microbial biology. Her thesis investigates the tripartite interaction chain between plants, plant pathogens, fungal hyperparasites across natural plant communities. For her project, Edith will be surveying plant communities to check plants for infections by powdery mildew and conducting cross-inoculation experiments. Outside of her work with plants, Edith enjoys sailing in the Monterey Bay, pottery, and backpacking.

Erica Fontanez

Phylogenetic and Biogeographic Analysis of Chloropyron (salty bird’s beak, Orobanchaceae), a genus of Salt Marsh Dependent Species

Erica is a first-year master student at the California Botanic Garden. She is conducting a phylogenetic and biogeographical analysis on the genus Chloropyron (Orobanchaceae), a hemi-parasitic plant that is restricted to inland and coastal marshlands throughout California, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, and Baja California, MX. She earned her Associate of Arts with an emphasis in Natural Sciences at Mt. San Antonio College, and her Bachelor of Science in Biology at Cal Poly, Pomona. After her undergraduate studies, she was accepted into an year-long NSF funded program called Research and Mentorship for Post-baccalaureates in Biological Sciences (RaMP) at the California Botanic Garden (CalBG), where she started her Chloropyron research by conducting phylogenetic and population level genomic analysis on the species Chloropyron tecopense.

Ethan VanValkenburg

Experimental Restoration of Serpentine Meadows

Ethan VanValkenburg is a PhD candidate in Biology at Stanford University in Tadashi Fukami's Community Ecology Lab. His research examines the community ecology, resilience, and restoration of plant-pollinator communities in California's serpentine grasslands and agroecological landscapes in southern Costa Rica. Originally from Michigan, he has loved getting to know California's natural history through research and finding local flora on hikes and bicycle rides. Before starting at Stanford, he investigated nectar micronutrients and pollinator behavior, perennializing crops, marsh birds in the Great Lakes, and ungulate biogeography.

Hannah Kang

Rapid Radiation and Cryptic Species: Clarifying Species Boundaries in the Navarretia leucocephala Complex

Hannah Kang is a second-year PhD student in the Biology Department at Brigham Young University, where she studies systematics of Navarretia. She earned her undergraduate degree in Plant Biology at the University of California, Davis, and later worked as a consulting botanist in Northern California. Her current research focuses on producing a phylogeny of Navarretia and resolving species limits within the Navarretia leucocephala complex, with particular emphasis on vernal pool ecosystems. She currently lives along Utah’s Wasatch Front, where she enjoys studying plants in a new landscape and taking advantage of Utah’s legendary ski days.

Kekoa Nelson

Prescribed fire in serpentine grasslands of varying restoration management histories

My name is Kekoa Nelson and I am a second year PhD student in the Graduate Group in Ecology at the University of California, Davis. I am in Justin Valliere’s Invasive Weed and Restoration Ecology lab studying prescribed fire in serpentine meadows in California. My favorite part of my project is conducting the vegetation surveys in the spring, since the meadows are covered in beautiful native forbs. My hobbies include playing soccer, snowboarding, and crocheting.

Marco Rene Castaneda Martinez

Utilizing seed and seedling traits to enhance seed collection strategies in a foundational species, Stipa pulchra.

My research interests include how California native plant communities respond to climate change, using plant ecophysiology and functional traits to inform restoration efforts. Specifically, I’m interested in how Stipa pulchra ecotypes respond to heat and water stress during early ontogeny and whether these responses are linked to functional traits related to survival. By linking stress responses to traits, my work aims to identify trait strategies that influence early survival and inform seed provenancing strategies. In my free time, I am an avid cyclist, hiker, and vinyl records collector.

Marife Auccapoma

Diversification and Endemism in Zeltnera (Gentianaceae): Phylogenomic and Morphological Perspectives on a Cryptic New World Lineage

Marife is a first-year PhD student at Claremont Graduate University/California Botanic Garden studying the phylogeny and morphology of Zeltnera (Gentianaceae). Through this research, Marife hopes to examine the roles of polyploidy and hybridization in shaping diversification and species delimitation in the genus, as well as conducting a revision and informing conservation efforts of Zeltnera. They graduated from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona in 2023 majoring in Plant Science. When not in the molecular lab, Marife can be found in a dance studio, doing embroidery, or hanging out with their cats.

Marjorie Rhodes

Characterizing impacts of hybridization in dominant obligate seeders of southern maritime chaparral.

Currently in her first year of study at California State University, Dominguez Hills' Biology Graduate Program, Marjorie is studying plant reproduction in obligate seeding plants of maritime chaparral. After graduating from UC Davis in 2021 with a degree in Environmental Science and Management, Marjorie returned home to Southern California, where she's worked in both environmental horticulture and habitat restoration ever since. Her work has inspired her to learn more about plant reproduction and seed biology, especially in the context of restoration ecology. Outside of her work and studies, she can be found searching for new library books, experimenting with soup recipes, and planning birding and hiking adventures.

Maya Canapary

Desert to Dunes: life history trade-offs across California’s arid landscapes

Maya is in the second year of her master’s degree at USF, where she is working on a common garden experiment which will look at life history patterns - seed dormancy, flowering time - in the Cryptantha genus. Before beginning her graduate degree, Maya participated in many field-based projects, becoming enamored with the diversity of California’s ecosystems and the wonderful and ridiculous adaptations of plants. Her previous work on conservation and restoration projects in arid landscapes sparked an interest in phenology and adaptation to climate variability. After finishing her MS, Maya hopes to continue to work in restoration and land management, zooming back out to once again focus on many different plant species.

Mia Manfredi

An integrative study examining the disjunct distribution of Salvia funerea M.E. Jones (Death Valley Sage, Lamiaceae)

Mia is currently a second-year master's student at California Botanic Garden where she is studying the disjunct distribution of Salvia funerea (Death Valley Sage), a rare shrub in the Mojave Desert. Mia was first introduced to the wonderful world of botany during her undergraduate education in Biological Sciences at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo and has since developed a passion for botanical fieldwork, plant conservation, and the fascinating flora of California. Her broad research interests include spatial and molecular ecology, biodiversity conservation, and global change biology. In addition to botany, Mia loves reading novels, cooking, and drinking coffee.

Molly Gans

Uncovering the pollination ecology of the native California wildflower, Silene verecunda

Molly Gans is a 3rd year Ph.D. candidate in the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department at University of Arizona. Her works centers on how plant pathogens impact the dynamics of pollination mutualisms, using the native perennial Silene verecunda, its moth pollinators, and a fungal pathogen as a study system. She uses both field studies and mathematical modeling to address her research questions, combining her love of the outdoors with her knowledge of theoretical ecology. Growing up in southern California, Molly spent lots of time in Mojave desert appreciating wildflowers, but it wasn't until doing undergraduate research on the epidemiology of plant diseases that she decided to pursue research on plant ecology and evolution in graduate school. In her free time, Molly enjoys cooking, playing ultimate frisbee, and writing poetry.

Nicholas Yoong

Assessing the potential for invertebrate-mediated microbial dispersal in eelgrass phyllosphere microbiomes

Nicholas is a second-year Ph.D. student in the population biology graduate group at UC Davis, studying microbial assembly and dispersal of the eelgrass microbiome. Nicholas fell in love with eelgrass ecosystems during his undergrad, where he conducted eelgrass plant and community surveys documenting meadow decline during a marine heat wave. Nicholas's dissertation research aims to determine whether small invertebrates living in eelgrass meadows disperse microbes between plants and how this may affect meadow health. Unlike in terrestrial systems, our understanding of how the microbiome affects and assembles marine plants remains uncertain. In his spare time, he enjoys running in the mountains or reading fantasy books.

Olivia Parra

Pile burn scars: an opportunity for restoration in invasive annual dominated grasslands

Olivia is a first generation student from Oxnard, California. She is currently a 3rd year PhD student at UC Davis studying the restoration of California’s invasive grass dominated landscapes. Prior to grad school, she worked as a restoration technician with the Santa Monica Mountains Fund and received her Bachelor’s degree at UC Berkeley. She is endlessly inspired by her friends and community who cultivate beautiful spaces for native plants and people to grow and flourish. Through her time in grad school and beyond, she desires to do the same. She further enriches her life by losing and finding herself while distance running or immersed in Latin American literature.

Poppy Northing

The genetic basis of climate adaptation in the desert annual Pectocarya recurvata

Poppy is a PhD candidate in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona. Her dissertation focuses on identifying the genetic basis of climate adaptation in a species of winter annual plant, Pectocarya recurvata, that is native to the Sonoran, Mojave, and Chihuahan deserts. Her research leverages a variety of techniques including field work, molecular lab work, and bioinformatics to ultimately identify genes that might be involved in adapting to climate change. Poppy loves spending active time outdoors, whether its collecting plants for her research, hiking, or playing soccer.

Ryan Kiser

Guiding Seed-Banking and Conservation Strategies for Sidalcea robusta, a Rare Butte County Endemic

I am a first-year graduate student pursuing a master's degree at Montana State University, and my research focuses on ecological restoration in the northern Sacramento Valley and Sierra Nevada Foothills. Before pursuing higher education, I worked on several organic vegetable farms throughout this region, and had an amazing opportunity to deepen my connection with these landscapes and communities. I learned about many native flora in the field, and gained skills with things like invasive species management. Learning about soil microbes, integrated pest management, hedgerows, and pollinator plantings inspired me to change directions with my career. In my free time, I love exploring the forests in my area, doing permaculture and native landscaping in my yard, and swimming in the creeks during summer. I am excited to contribute to conservation research for California native plants and apply this work towards restoring resilient plant communities.

Sachi Srivastava

Leapfrog at Record Heights: Investigating the spread, drivers, and spatial dynamics of Jeffrey pine (P. jeffreyi) population establishment at treeline in the Sierra Nevada, CA

Sachi is a first-year Master's student in the Graduate Group in Ecology at UC Davis. She works with her colleagues in the Safford Vegetation and Fire Ecology lab to understand changes in subalpine forest structure in the Sierra Nevada and the implications of these changes for long term adaptation and landscape resilience. Her project focuses on climate and dispersal-driven Jeffrey pine range expansion into subalpine habitat currently dominated by vulnerable white pine species. She is particularly interested in what species ecological tolerances, spatial ecology, and dispersal syndromes can tell us about species distributions as climate change progresses. Her additional interests include prescribed and cultural fire, which has led her to complete federal wildland firefighter training and work as a coordinator for the California Fire Science Consortium's Sierra Nevada Subregion. She hopes to pursue a career in forest management and science outreach.

Sierra Vasinthascha

The fungi of the cobra lily: The role of fungal communities in shaping decomposition and nutrient cycling in Darlingtonia californica

Sierra is a first-year graduate student at Cal Poly Humboldt studying microbes and how they interact with their environments. Her research focuses on the microbial community found within Darlingtonia, with particular interest in fungi and yeasts that are often overlooked in microbial research. She enjoys learning more about these tiny powerhouses and how they fit into plant-associated ecosystems. When she’s not doing academic work, she enjoys spending time with her husband and dogs at the beach.

Sivaraj Gangothri

Using evolutionary and ecological approaches to study the diversity of Penstemon clevelandii (Plantaginaceae)

Gangothri is a third-year PhD student at the University of California, Riverside. Her research focuses on understanding how hybridization can give rise to new species in plants. Currently, she is studying the ecological and genetic mechanisms underlying hybrid speciation in native Penstemon species of Southern California. Gangothri developed her interest in plant adaptation and speciation during her master’s studies in India and has since continued exploring these questions in California ecosystems. Her fieldwork has taken her across national parks and forests throughout Southern California, an experience she feels incredibly lucky to have had. Through her research, Gangothri hopes to inform conservation strategies for restricted plant populations and contribute to our understanding of the evolutionary processes that generate biodiversity. Outside of research, she enjoys playing the violin and creating botanical illustrations.

Yuerong Xiao

Hydrological and Ecological Effects of Cultural Burning on Native Plant Regrowth in Sierra Nevada Meadows

Yuerong Xiao is a 2nd year PhD student in Earth System Science at Stanford University. Interested in fire ecology and Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK), they have participated in many cultural burns with the North Fork Mono Tribe, from whom they learned that burning helps increase the diversity of native plants traditionally used for cultural practices according to generations of TEK. By documenting the ecological benefits of Indigenous fire stewardship, Yuerong aims to provide data to strengthen tribal practices and support broader recognition of Indigenous fire stewardship in native plant ecosystems. In their free time, Yuerong loves going camping with friends and making hotpot.