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Buffalo State Stories
Amy McMillan, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Biology
Given a choice, Amy McMillan, an evolutionary biologist, chose Buffalo State as the place she wanted to be. Why? Because she was looking for a medium-sized university, a place where she could conduct research, teach, and involve students in her research.
“When I was an undergraduate,” she said, “I met my first and most important academic mentor, Dr. Mac Butler. By working with him for three years as an undergraduate, I developed a confidence in my abilities as a researcher that has sustained me ever since. I decided to get my Ph.D. and then give students the same kind of opportunities I’d had.”
Rewarding Science
After graduation, McMillan was a post-doctoral fellow for the federal Environmental Protection Agency. She enjoys doing applied research—research intended to shed light on a given question or problem. “At Buffalo State,” she said. “I can be a conservationist and do applied work, and it’s perfectly acceptable. Plus, undergraduate students are usually more interested in applied research than in basic research.”
From her point of view as a scientist, McMillan sees all research as part of a massive continuum moving toward the goal of understanding the world better. The satisfaction of being part of that effort is deeply rewarding, as is sharing its excitement with students.
“I like to get people while they’re still new to research,” she said. “They’re interested in what I’m doing, they’re excited about what I’m doing, but they have absolutely no idea what I do. When you get them into the lab, the lights start coming on. As they become more excited and more interested, they go off and do wonderful things.”
Loons and More
McMillan runs The Loon Lab–really a lab for population genetics research—in the soon-to-be-refurbished Science Building. Already, she has a DNA sequencer/genotyper, a high-end instrument like those used by forensic labs to do DNA work.
McMillan and her students examine DNA from common loons. The loon, which breeds in Canada and the northern United States and migrates to the Atlantic and Pacific coasts in winter, is already considered a threatened species by some states. For the last six years, hundreds of loons have been found dead of botulism in the Great Lakes during their annual migration. Scientists estimate that thousands more have died. DNA research enables scientists to evaluate many things, including the impact of the botulism deaths on North America’s common loon population.
Students with other interests pursue them under McMillan’s guidance. One student is researching hellbenders, the only giant salamander that lives in the United States. Another is examining the DNA from primate fecal samples.
College Support Forthcoming
The support McMillan expected from Buffalo State for both her research and her teaching has been forthcoming. “We have some of the best students,” she said. “A good student is one who is excited, happy, and interested in their future, their lives, and in what we can give to them. Our students recognize what we give, and they give it back by working in our labs and doing great things.”
