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Ralph Washington Jr. has loved insects since he was 8 years old.
"I have loved insects since I was 8 years old, when I found them in a vacant lot near my house," says Ralph Washington Jr., a Ph.D. student at the University of California, Davis. "The discarded appliances, drug paraphernalia and overgrown weeds provided various microhabitats in which lived many kinds of insects. This taught me that you can find wondrous things in even the bleakest of places. I continue to study insects because of a simple truth: Terrestrial life is one of the most amazing things to happen in the history of the universe. To fully appreciate that truth, you have to study biodiversity, and entomology is the best way to do so."
Credit: Karin Higgins, UC Davis Strategic Communications
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