Elizabeth (Susie) J. Balser

Illinois Wesleyan’s Balser Named Co-Editor of National Biology Journal

Feb. 28, 2003

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. — Elizabeth (Susie) J. Balser, associate professor of biology at Illinois Wesleyan University, has been named co-editor of Invertebrate Biology, a quarterly journal of the American Microscopical Society and the Society of Comparative and Integrative Biology’s Division of Invertebrate Zoology.

Balser has been a member of the Illinois Wesleyan faculty since 1996. She is a zoologist with training in the structure, function, and evolution of invertebrate animals. Her research pursuits include comparative examination of the structure and development of the kidney in sea stars and other echinoderms. Her work has led to new discoveries of cloning in the developmental stages of sea stars and their relatives and has been recently published with co-author William Jaeckle, also an Illinois Wesleyan professor, in Natural History magazine.

A graduate of Lander University, Balser received the Ph.D. from Clemson University and was a post-doctoral fellow at the Smithsonian Marine Station at Fort Pierce, Fla. Research that she and co-researchers at the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute conducted on light-emitting suckers of a deep-sea octopus was featured as a cover story in Nature in 1999.

Invertebrate Biology ranks among the oldest continuously published journals in the United States. It began publication in 1880 and was previously known as Transactions of the American Microscopical Society. It covers all aspects of invertebrate biology and is designed "to promote high-quality research and teaching about invertebrates." Articles published in the journal undergo a rigorous peer-review process and must present original research focused on understanding invertebrate organisms.