Think Globally, Act Locally
Carlos Iudica, assistant professor of biology

by Erin Markel '07

Iudica poses in his lab with a number of mammalian skulls he has collected in Pennsylvania.

Carlos Iudica's methods of research may unsettle the passer-by. Once, Iudica was hacking off the head of a bear along the side of I-80 when a state trooper approached him, hand on holster. "What the hell are you doing?" Iudica remembers the trooper asked.

The professor stood up, his blood-covered hands holding a scalpel, and explained that he had an official permit to salvage roadkill in the state of Pennsylvania for research. The trooper decided to believe him, and quickly drove away.

"This happens almost every time on I-80," Iudica says with a smile. Using roadkill as well as carcasses donated by trappers, Iudica is building a teaching collection of bones and skins at Susquehanna. He hopes to someday publish pictorial identification guides of the bones and hairs of every mammal in Pennsylvania.

"The rest of the department is extremely supportive," Iudica says, "although I sometimes make the department smell like a morgue."

Iudica had never heard of Susquehanna University before he applied to work there, but he got hooked on SU during his interview with Professor of Biology David Richard.

"I didn't realize what I was looking for until Dave put it into words," Iudica says. "He said that this is a department where we teach how to do research, and I realized, wow, this is exactly what I want....I like to share."

Having pursued the science of ecology all over the world, Iudica has a lot to share. He has studied forest ecology in his native Argentina and the influence of fruit bats on rainforests in Costa Rica and Panama; monitored flying foxes ("little Chihuahuas with wings") in Guam and Papua New Guinea; taught field techniques for studying mammal ecology in Nicaragua; and researched bats in the American Museum of Natural History and the Smithsonian.

Iudica says, "You learn and appreciate things every time you are exposed to another culture. And if you are an open-minded kind of person, I am sure you can translate that into better teaching."

Although he plans to continue traveling abroad, Iudica intends to stay at Susquehanna. "I really feel at home," he says.