Our Team

Principal Investigator

Katie is an Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences at Fordham University. The Turo lab is based at the beautiful Louis Calder Biological Field Station in Armonk, NY, and Katie teaches at Fordham’s Rose Hill campus in the Bronx.

Broadly, Katie considers herself a community ecologist and conservation biologist. She combines large-scale field studies with molecular and quantitative tools to examine the mechanisms driving insect biodiversity, fitness, and plant-pollinator interactions in the Anthropocene. Her recent research interests include, (1) which forest plants are important forage for bees? And (2) how do native bees respond to current forestry practices across large spatial and temporal scales?

Katie obtained her PhD in Entomology from The Ohio State University and then joined Rachael Winfree’s Lab at Rutgers University as a Postdoctoral Scientist. When not at work, you can find her going hiking with her 2 kids and husband, reading a novel, or playing a board game.

C. V. / turo@fordham.edu

Graduate Student

Rachely is a current Biological Sciences Graduate student within the ecology concentration at Fordham University. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Biology in 2024 and has an extensive background in molecular biology and laboratory methodologies. Her research interests are in plant–pollinator ecology, with a focus on bee foraging, floral resource use, and plant–pollinator interactions in northeastern forest systems. She is particularly interested in combining molecular approaches, including DNA metabarcoding, with ecological field research to investigate the plants bees interact with and how forest structure, plant invasions, and environmental change influence bee diets, nutrition, and resource use. Through her research, she hopes to better understand how changes in plant communities affect pollinators and contribute to conservation strategies that support native bees and the ecosystems they depend on.

Email: rsk9@fordham.edu

Valerie is a current Biological Sciences PhD student within the ecology concentration at Fordham University. She graduated from the University of Massachusetts Lowell in Spring 2026 with a Bachelor of Science in Biology, along with two minors in Geology and Climate Change and Sustainability. Her research interests are in urban ecology, with an emphasis on landscape ecology and plant-bee systems. She is particularly interested in how human development and land management practices affect how bees navigate, use, and persist in urban spaces. Through her research, she hopes to contribute knowledge that further informs the design of biodiverse and ecologically sustainable cities.

Email: valerie@fordham.edu

Graduate Student

We are recruiting 1-2 new students to join our lab in Fall 2027! Our physical lab is based at Fordham University’s Louis Calder Biological Field Station in Armonk, NY. See Join for more details.