What Beetles Can Teach Us About the Importance of Diversity

Biologist Lynette Strickland thinks a tiny, golden bug may hold the answers to big questions

By Marc Chalufour

A range of wildly colored tortoise beetles inhabit Panama’s rainforests. Some have red shells with black polka dots or black stripes over orange shells or red shells and black heads. Then there are some with metallic gold stripes that look as though they were carefully applied by a painter’s brush. Until recently, many scientists assumed each represented a different species. But Lynette Strickland thought otherwise, responding, “Have you seen me and my sister?”

Chelymorpha phenotypes

Strickland, an assistant professor of biological sciences, is the daughter of a Mexican mother and Black father. She is 5 feet, 6 inches tall with black hair. Her sister is shorter, lighter skinned, and has light brown hair. They look so different their mom nicknamed them her sun and her moon. After years of assuring doubters they were, indeed, sisters, Strickland didn’t hesitate to question the scientific orthodoxy claiming Panama’s beetles were unrelated. For her dissertation, she used genetic and genomic testing to prove that one species, Chelymorpha alternans, includes a range of different-looking beetles. 

Now, Strickland is setting up a lab at BU, where she plans to expand her integrated approach, combining behavioral observation with genetics. The answers she seeks aren’t just about a group of colorful beetles—Strickland is interested in understanding the role diversity plays in the survival of all living things.

For example, why do these tortoise beetles live in harmony while humans often make judgments based on the relatively slight genetic difference of skin color? It’s a question that links Strickland’s research with her lived experiences and her desire to make the science community more inclusive. “There’s a lot that can be learned from understanding the importance of variation in nature,” she says. 

The Most Diverse Animal on Earth

Beetles are an especially rich subject for scientists interested in biodiversity. The 400,000 known species represent one in every four animals on Earth. They thrive in deserts, forests, lakes, and on the Arctic tundra. 

In 2015, Strickland, then a PhD candidate in evolution, ecology, and behavior at the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign, took a two-week course on tropical ecology in Panama. When she arrived, Donald Windsor, a staff scientist with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, which conducted the course, told Strickland she might see a golden beetle in the wild. “I was so enamored, which was funny because I wasn’t really an insect person before,” says Strickland, whose undergraduate degree was in marine biology.

Determined to find one of the beetles, she began searching the rainforest, but all she could find were yellow and orange bugs. Finally, on a hike to the Panama–Costa Rica border, Strickland wandered away from her colleagues as they watched the sun set. “I turned over a leaf and there’s this metallic gold beetle, and I knew—this is the one!” Strickland says, then adds, with a laugh, “This is the most romantic story of my life.” 

Her curiosity piqued, Strickland began asking questions about the genetics of the golden beetle. “We know almost nothing,” she recalls Windsor saying. He had observed the variations of tortoise beetles in the wild and believed they were the same species, but nobody had done the lab work to prove it. The experience ended up inspiring her dissertation—and shaping her career to this point.

“I wanted my work to be integrative,” she says. “I want to approach things in a lot of different ways and to be constantly learning new skills.” She’s observed beetle behavior in the wild, mated them in the lab, studied what they eat and how predators react to their variations, and analyzed their DNA and RNA. She hopes one day to partner with someone to use gene-editing technology to study them further. 

Strickland’s research has taught her that, if anything, beetles are “way more diverse than we thought.” The genes that determine the coloration of many beetle species do not serve that function for Chelymorpha alternans. So how do they get their colors, and why do they vary so greatly? Strickland is still trying to figure that out. 

In studying how predators react to beetles’ color variations, Strickland noticed that they were less likely to eat those with metallic coloration. In other words: variation within the species could help it survive in different environments. 

“Saying that a species does better the more diverse they are is an incredible, beautiful concept,” Strickland said in an appearance on the podcast Language of God

DEI in Science

For Strickland, studying diversity in nature and promoting it in society go hand in hand. Her personal experiences led her to question the assumption that the Panamanian tortoise beetles weren’t related. For science to answer the world’s most pressing questions, she says, “We need people who are different, who have different perspectives and different backgrounds.”

Strickland has emerged as a strong voice for inclusion in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields, often arguing that efforts to build diversity are unlikely to succeed if not accompanied by changes to an unwelcoming culture. 

In 2017, she coauthored a column for Science criticizing institutions for recruiting students from underrepresented groups while failing to address discrimination, microaggressions, and systemic biases that can discourage them from remaining in science. “The current system attracts and retains a relatively narrow range of individuals,” the group wrote. “Does it produce good scientists? Yes. Does it facilitate a diverse scientific community? Not so much.” 

In 2020, Strickland and four other Black women published a column in Nature Ecology & Evolution, calling on institutions to stop forcing scientists who are Black, Indigenous, and people of color to assimilate to white spaces and, instead, to work toward building a more inclusive community. “We have long been told to travel the safest route, be aware of consequences, decrease our perceived threat and then maybe we can survive within academic institutions,” they wrote. “We are offended and disappointed by the continuation of an assimilation mindset.” 

Strickland says she’s seen progress. Conferences that used to marginalize discussions of diversity, equity, and inclusion now prioritize them. And, she says, an increasing number of institutions are addressing racist practices and policies in effective, intentional ways. She’s also supporting the next generation of scientists of color as a board member of Black in Genetics, a nonprofit that works to create job opportunities and promote racial equity in the genetics field.

“It’s once you realize that someone else asked a question that you had never even thought of, a question that had never occurred to you, that we truly start to see the benefits of diversity and inclusion,” Strickland said to the hosts of the Language of God. “How many questions are we missing out on because we don’t have inclusive institutions performing science?”

Understanding Biodiversity

When Strickland’s lab opens in spring 2024, it will meet strict US Department of Agriculture standards for the study of species not native to the United States. The lab will have an escape-proof room to breed beetles, with sealed windows, drains and vents blocked with fine mesh, and doors framed with special gaskets. In a separate room, she’ll have equipment for conducting DNA and RNA extractions and beetle dissections. 

Although her focus remains on Chelymorpha alternans, she’s also interested in learning more about other tortoise beetles. She’s even tracked one species to Boston’s Franklin Park, where she finds them munching on morning glories. “Beetles have been able to inhabit every type of environment on our planet, so understanding what has made them so successful is a really big question,” she says. “What allows this one to survive a Boston winter?” Understanding beetles’ success could help scientists understand which species are best equipped to handle climate change. 

Strickland also wants to learn why there’s so much variation in some populations but not others—and what are the consequences and benefits of that variation? Ultimately, she says, she hopes to piece together the clues to answer perhaps the biggest question of all: What creates biodiversity?

“One of the most exciting things about the world is that it’s so diverse,” she says. “We won’t even be able to describe it all in our lifetime. That’s kind of beautiful.”