In this episode, I speak with Hannah Davis, a PhD student in Biology. We talk about her research with fruit flies, her previous research with termites, and we talk a bit about wasps, hover flies, and what it’s like to be expecting a child for the first time! Introduction (0:00:30) Why fruit flies are a model organism in science (0:01:33) Choosing to study insects out of curiosity (0:02:50) What is a “chill coma”? (0:04:01) Fruit fly cold tolerance traits (0:06:12) The hardiness of one specific fruit fly species (0:08:40) Research during COVID (0:09:58) Differences between ants and termites (0:10:35) Body structure between ants and termites (0:12:55) Termites are social cockroaches! (0:14:09) The caste system in termite colonies (0:15:28) Termites have a king! (0:16:30) Lab colonies are different from the wild (0:17:45) Watching termites is fun! (0:18:48) The termite soldier class (0:19:27) What did they feed termites in the lab? (0:22:20) Hannah’s research with termites (0:23:42) Diseases that affect termites (0:25:20) Pest insects are great to study! (0:26:37) The smell in labs! (0:28:30) Studying science in Germany (0:31:20) University differences between Canada and Germany (0:34:39) Differences in creatures and fauna (0:37:50) Talking about hornets! (0:39:45) A hornet’s stinger is a modified lady part! (0:40:56) Hannah’s love of hover flies (0:43:20) Mimicry in nature (0:46:25) The love of spiders (0:48:07) Hannah is expecting a baby! (0:49:12) Plans for the next year (0:55:34) Hannah Davis on ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Hannah_Davis3 Visit Planet B612 on the web: http://planetb612.fm/ Follow Planet B612 on Twitter: https://twitter.com/PlanetB612fm Support Planet B612 on Patreon: https://patreon.com/juliesworld