Katie is a postdoc co-advised with Bing Brunton. She is an evolutionary biologist primarily interested in how anatomical novelty influences the evolution of animal locomotion. Her doctoral project in the lab of Sharlene Santana at UW focused on a unique skeletal element in the bat hindlimb wing membrane. Currently, she is trying to understand the exceptional lumbosacral spinal cord of birds, which may act as a mechanosensory structure that helps birds balance.

Website: www.katiestanchak.com