About

The Toxopeus lab researches how insects and other critters survive winter at St. Francis Xavier University, located in Mi’kma’ki, the ancestral and unceded territory of the Mi’kmaq People (a.k.a. Nova Scotia, Canada). Use the menu tabs above to read more about our team, the research we do, opportunities to join the lab, and information about the courses that Dr. Toxopeus teaches.

Recent News

2 April 2026 – Nice news about an older publication: Lemay et al. 2024 was in the top 10 most-cited articles last year in the Physiological Entomology journal!

1 April 2026 – No foolin’ – the Toxopeus lab was quoted in a CBC news article about ticks!

24 March 2026 – This evening was StFX Student Research Night – congratulations to all the students who shared posters of their research, including Kenechukwu!

Kenechukwu presenting his poster on spruce budworm at StFX Student Research Night

13 March 2026 – Congratulations to Kenechukwu Ojukwu, who passed his PhD Comprehensive Exam today!! Kenechukwu is now officially a PhD candidate!

9 March 2026 – Well done and thanks to Teresa Keenan for representing the StFX Biology department with a presentation at the Science Atlantic Biology and Applied Aquatic Sciences conference this past weekend.

Action shot of Teresa explaining their experimental design at Science Atlantic!

9 February 2026 – Congratulations to Teresa Keenan, who presented their Honours talk in the StFX Biology Seminar Series today!

3 February 2026 – The Toxopeus lab is in the StFX News!

2 February 2026 – Thanks to all who came out to see Jantina’s talk for the Nova Scotia Insitute of Sciences on tick overwintering. There is a recording at this link.

29 January 2026 – Publication news: our stonefly cold tolerance manuscript is now available online!

5 January 2026 – Welcome to María Alas Romero, who is conducting a project on how RNA interference affects the cytoskeleton of freeze-tolerant crickets as part of her Biol 499 Directed Study course! Welcome back to Jona Lopez Pedersen, who is staying on post-MSc to complete some additional spruce budworm work.

27 November 2025 – Big congratulations to Jona on a successful MSc thesis defense today! You can read their thesis here.

Waiting for our post-defense celebratory waffles! From left to right: Kenechukwu, Dr. Rodela, Maranda, Amber, Jona, Erin, Teresa

6 November 2025 – Manuscript accepted! Congratulations to Jona and Luke, whose article on stonefly cold tolerance has been accepted for publication by the Canadian Entomologist!! It’ll be a few weeks before it’s available online, but you can always read the the pre-print if you really want to know all about it right this second.

15 October 2025 – Kenechukwu, Jona, and Jantina had fun running a hands-on bug-freezing activity for high school students visiting StFX for Black Excellence Day!

8 October 2025 – Jona and Luke’s stonefly pre-print was featured in the Journal of Experimental Biology’s preLights!

1 October 2025 – Farewell and safe travels to Yunyi Yang, who worked in our group as a Mitacs Globalink intern for the last 3 months!

29 September 2025 – Welcome to Kiersten MacGrath, a new undergraduate volunteer who is helping take care of the cricket colony this semester!

17 September 2025 – A new CSZ Blog Post highlights the EDI workshop that Jantina helped organize this summer. Lots of good tips on building and supporting diverse research groups!

22 August 2025 – Farewell (but not really farewell!) to Amber, who has finished up her summer project! Amber but will continue to work in the lab on oyster heat tolerance with Drs. Tammy Rodela and Russell Wyeth.

21 August 2025 – Manuscript accepted!! Congratulations to Kenechukwu for his contribution to our new paper on how acclimation alters energy storage and mitochondrial function in freeze-tolerant crickets, in collaboration with Dr. Nicolas Pichaud‘s lab at U de Moncton.

20 August 2025 – Well done to Teresa, who has wrapped up her summer research. She’ll be back for more as she completes her Honours thesis during the 2025-2026 academic year!

16 August 2025 – Had a nice end-of-summer mini golfing session with the lab!

Look at us glow! From left to right: Jantina, Jona, Teresa, Kenechukwu, Yunyi

7 August 2025 – New pre-print! This nice note on winter-active stonefly cold tolerance is based on side-projects that Jona Lopez Pedersen and Luke Burton completed during their MSc degrees.

18 July 2025 – Well done to both Jona Lopez Pedersen and Kenechukwu Ojukwu for presenting their research on spruce budworm overwintering at ISEPEP (International Symposium on the Environmental Physiology of Ectotherms and Plants) in Vancouver, BC this week! Jantina also presented on an in-progress project with our freeze-tolerant crickets.

Fun at the Vancouver Aquarium before the ISEPEP conference! Left to right: Kenechukwu, Jona, Jantina

11 July 2025 – The Toxopeus lab was defeated in a Mario Kart tournament with the Rodela lab today, with Jona snagging runner up.

2 July 2025 – Welcome to Yunyi Yang, who joins us for 3 months on a Mitacs Globalink Research Internship!

26 June 2025 – Failed to take a photo, but we had a nice lab brunch this morning!

12 June 2025 – Congratulations to both Jona Lopez Pedersen (1st place) and Kenechukwu Ojukwu (runner up) for winning poster awards at the Acadian Entomological Society annual meeting this week in Moncton, NB!

Kenechukwu (left) and Jona (right) with their budworm posters at AES!

31 May 2025 – Jantina enjoyed facilitating land-based learning activities at StFX’s inaugural X-STEM camp for Mi’kmaw and African Nova Scotian youth.

5 May 2025 – Big congrats to Jona Lopez Pedersen, who was the Graduate Student winner of the Nova Scotia Institute of Sciences (NSIS) Science and Technology Communication Award  for their essay on diapause. We made the trip to Halifax for the awards ceremony!

Jona receiving an NSIS Science and Technology Communication award

5 May 2025 – Welcome back to summer research students Teresa Keenan and Amber Gough. Both will be working with freeze-tolerant crickets this summer!

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