Photo by Tony Rinaldo

Edward, Frances, and Shirley B. Daniels Fellow

“I broke out of my academic bubble at Radcliffe. I made a lot of progress in my scientific research—it was the most productive year of my career—but I had another kind of breakthrough that I never expected.

“As a biologist, I do very basic research on the evolutionary history of sound production in arthropods, but I’ve always worried that what I do doesn’t matter outside my field. This is a chronic problem for many academics.

“After a lot of conversations with other Radcliffe fellows and also after hearing an inspiring talk by Sheila Tobias ’57 at the Schlesinger Library, I’ve come to feel very strongly that there’s fundamental value in studying and understanding the world we live in. This knowledge improves the quality of our lives. Now I’m developing outreach programs to try to get young students interested in science.”

Sheila Patek, who has a strong interest in music and has played the piano for thirty years, conducts research on sound production in marine organisms. She discovered that Caribbean spiny lobsters use a violinlike mechanism to generate sound during interactions with predators. Findings like this hold answers to fundamental questions about evolution. 

Formerly an assistant professor in the Department of Integrative Biology at the University of California at Berkeley, Patek recently accepted a position as a professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

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