Journal of Comparative Physiology A - Meet the Editors of the Journal of Comparative Physiology A

Editor-in-Chief

Günther K.H. Zupanc

Department of Biology
Northeastern University
Boston, Massachusetts, United States
Email g.zupanc@northeastern.edu (this opens in a new tab)

Günther K.H. Zupanc studied Biology and Physics at the University of Regensburg, Germany, and was awarded a Ph.D. in Neurosciences from the University of California, San Diego. He received his Habilitation in Animal Physiology from the University of Tübingen, Germany. His past research and faculty appointments included positions at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California; the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology in Tübingen, Germany; the University of Ottawa, Canada; the University of Manchester, U.K.; and the International University Bremen/Jacobs University in Germany. Since 2009, he has been a Professor in the Department of Biology at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts. During his career, he has served in several leadership positions, including Department Chair at Northeastern. The focus of his research is on neural plasticity of the adult central nervous system (especially in relation to behavioral plasticity) in teleost fish. In addition to approximately 170 journal articles and book chapters, he has authored or edited 14 books and Special Journal Issues, including Behavioral Neurobiology: An Integrative Approach (Oxford University Press), which, since the publication of its first edition in 2004, has evolved as a standard text in teaching neuroethology.

Associate Editors

Kentaro Arikawa

Department of Evolutionary Studies of Biosystems
SOKENDAI (The Graduate University for Advanced Studies)
Shonan Village, Hayama, Kanagawa, Japan
Email arikawa@soken.ac.jp (this opens in a new tab)

Kentaro Arikawa studies color vision of invertebrates, particularly in butterflies. To understand what and how butterflies see, he employs a broad spectrum of techniques, including behavioral analysis, physiology, anatomy, molecular biology, as well as computational modeling and simulation. He graduated from Jiyu-Gakuen College in Tokyo in natural sciences and Sophia University Graduate School in Tokyo in behavioral biology. During his graduate study, he discovered that yellow swallowtail butterflies can sense light with their genitals, an ability mediated by a photoreceptive system that he subsequently analyzed in terms of its mechanism and function. After a 20-year tenure as a biology professor at Yokohama City University, he joined the Graduate University for Advanced Studies (SOKENDAI) in 2006. Arikawa was also a visiting fellow at the Australian National University and an NIH research fellow at Indiana University, Bloomington. In addition to about 150 peer-reviewed papers, he has contributed chapters to several books, including several Japanese textbooks on sensory biology.

Charlotte Helfrich-Förster

Biozentrum
Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg
Würzburg, Germany
Email charlotte.foerster@biozentrum.uni-wuerzburg.de (this opens in a new tab)

Charlotte Helfrich-Förster studied Biology at the Universities of Stuttgart and Tübingen, Germany. She received her Ph.D. in Plant Physiology and her Habilitation in Zoology from the University of Tübingen. Her past research and faculty appointments included positions at the Max Planck Institute for Cybernetics, Tübingen and the University of Tübingen. From 2001 to 2009, she was Associate Professor of Zoology at the University of Regensburg. Since 2009, she has been Professor for Neurobiology and Genetics at the Julius-Maximilians University of Würzburg, Germany. She served as Dekan (Head) of the Faculty of Biology (2019–2021), Speaker of the Biocenter of the University of Würzburg (2014–2016) and Speaker of a Collaborative Research Center of the German Research Foundation (DFG) on Insect Timing (2013–2017). Her main research interest is on circadian rhythms and their neuronal control in insects (with particular focus on Drosophila melanogaster). She has published about 150 peer-reviewed journal articles and over 15 invited book chapters, review papers, and popular science articles.

Uwe Homberg

Department of Biology
Philipps-Universität Marburg
Marburg, Germany
Email homberg@biologie.uni-marburg.de (this opens in a new tab)

Uwe Homberg studied Biology at the University of Hannover and the Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. He received a doctorate for his thesis research on sensory coding in the brain of honeybees from the Freie Universität Berlin. Following studies on moth olfaction during postdoctoral positions at Columbia University, New York and the University of Arizona, Tucson, he received his Habilitation at the University of Konstanz. Subsequently, he worked as a Heisenberg-Fellow at the Universities of Konstanz and Regensburg on signal processing in the central complex of desert locusts and on neural mechanisms of circadian rhythms in cockroaches. Since 1997, Homberg has been Professor at Philipps-Universität Marburg, Germany. He served as Acting Director of the Zoological Institute at the University of Regensburg (1996–1997) and as Dekan (Head) of the focuses on the anatomical, neurochemical, and functional analysis of the insect brain, in particular neural mechanisms of sky compass coding and spatial orientation, as well as the organization of the circadian system. In addition to over 130 peer-reviewed publications, he has contributed chapters to several books, including a standard German textbook on animal physiology.

Wolfgang Rössler

Biozentrum
Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg
Würzburg, Germany
Email roessler@biozentrum.uni-wuerzburg.de (this opens in a new tab)

Wolfgang Rössler studied Biology, received his Ph.D. in Zoology/Neurobiology, and completed his Habilitation in Animal Physiology at the University of Marburg, Germany. Supported by a fellowship from the German Research Foundation (DFG), he joined the Arizona Research Laboratories Division of Neurobiology, University of Arizona as a Research Associate. His past faculty appointments include positions as Assistant Professor in Molecular Neurophysiology at the University of Göttingen and as Associate Professor of Neuroethology at the University of Würzburg, Germany. Since 2011, he has been Professor of Behavioral Physiology & Sociobiology at this institution. He served as Dekan (Head) of the Faculty of Biology (2011–2013) and Vice-Speaker and Speaker, respectively, of two Collaborative Research Centers of the German Research Foundation (DFG). Since 2019, he has been vice-speaker of the Biocenter of the University of Würzburg. His research focusses on the neuroethology of social insects. Using ants and bees as experimental models, he studies the neuronal basis of multimodal navigation, olfactory perception, and behavioral plasticity. He has authored approximately 140 journal articles and book chapters, co-authored a textbook on animal physiology, and co-edited special journal issues.

Andrea Megela Simmons

Department of Cognitive, Linguistic & Psychological Sciences 
Brown University
Providence, Rhode Island, United States
Email andrea_simmons@brown.edu (this opens in a new tab)

Andrea Megela Simmons received her Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Pennsylvania, where she studied Biopsychology under the direction of Norman T. Adler as well as European Medieval History. She was awarded a Ph.D. in Psychology, with a focus on the biopsychology of auditory perception, from Harvard University. Her formal introduction to neuroethology occurred while a postdoctoral research associate at Cornell University in the laboratory of Robert R. Capranica. She is currently Professor of Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences (primary appointment) and of Neuroscience (secondary appointment) at Brown University. The focus of her research is the neuroethology of acoustic communication and auditory perception, primarily in adult and developing anuran amphibians but recently expanded to include echolocating bats. She teaches courses on Animal Behavior (from a neuroethological perspective), Brain Evolution, and Psychology of Hearing on both undergraduate and graduate levels. She has published over 100 journal articles and book chapters, and co-edited the volume on Acoustic Communication (2003) of the Springer Handbook of Auditory Research.

Eric J. Warrant

Department of Biology
Lunds Universitet
Lund, Sweden
Email eric.warrant@biol.lu.se (this opens in a new tab)

Eric J. Warrant is Professor of Zoology at the University of Lund in Sweden. He studied Physics and Entomology at the University of New South Wales and completed a Ph.D. in visual science at the Australian National University. Following a postdoc and research fellowship at the University of Lund, he became Professor in 2002. He is currently president of the International Society of Neuroethology. Warrant leads a research group studying vision and visual navigation in nocturnal animals. His research has led to the discovery of neural principles that permit vision in dim light. In recent years, his group has turned its attention to the sensory basis of long-distance migration in nocturnal insects, particularly the role of the Earth’s magnetic field and the stars in migratory navigation. Warrant has published almost 200 original papers, reviews, and commentary articles, has co-edited 2 books and 3 Special Journal Issues, and has co-authored the book Visual Ecology (Princeton University Press), which won a 2015 Prose Award.