The Orthopterists’ Society received 33 applications from 18 countries for Travel Grants to the 13th International Congress of Orthopterology (ICO) in Morocco (March 24-28, 2019). The proposals were selected based on the nature and quality of the proposal and the resulting contribution to the Congress. After a very difficult selection process, 12 travel grants were funded as listed below.
Africa:
1) Charly Oumarou Ngoute (Yaoundé, Cameroon): “Effect of anthropogenic pressures on grasshopper species diversity (Orthoptera: Acrididae) from the forests and fallows of three localities of southern Cameroon”
2) Sory Cisse et al (Bamako, Mali): “Quantitative analysis of behavior phase difference in locusts with the examination of spatial distribution patterns”
Asia:
1) Jiajia Dong et al. (Xi’an, PR China): “Systematics and biogeography of the genus Cardiodactylus (Orthoptera: Eneopterinae: Lebinthini) in the Southeast Asia”
2) Ahmed Ali Samejo (& Riffat Sultana) (Jamshoro, Pakistan): “Factors affecting seasonal displacement of Schistocerca gregaria between Thar and Baluchistan, Pakistan”
3) Matan Shelomi et al. (Taipei, Taiwan): “Activities and evolution of Polyneopteran cellulolytic enzymes”
Europe:
1) Darron Cullen et al. (Leuven, Belgium & Cambridgeshire, UK): “Carotene-based sexual signalling in locusts”
2) Xinyang Zhang (& Berthold Hedwig) (Cambridge, UK): “Exploring the response to attractive and non-attractive pulse patterns in the song recognition network of a cricket”
North America:
1) Douglas Lawton et al. (Phoenix, USA): “Not all food patches are the same: distribution of preferred diets impacts locust phase change”
2) Itzel Lemus et al. (Mexico City, Mexico): “Diet characterization of Taeniopoda auricornis (Orthoptera: Romalieidae) through its ontogeny, using DNA barcodes, in a Sabal Palmetto woodland in Mexico”
South America:
1) Martina Pocco et al. (La Plata, Argentina): “Phenotypic plasticity in the South American locust, Schistocera cancellate (Acrididae)”
2) María Celeste Scattolini et al. (La Plata, Argentina): “Diversity, distribution and conservation status of the South American dichroplines (Orthoptera: Acrididae)” and “Diversification patterns in Scotussae (Orthoptera: Acrididae) genus group”
3) Vinícius Wilson et al. (Viçosa, Brasil): “Effects of latitude on the molecular evolution rate of the grasshoppers (Insecta: Orthoptera)”