About Me

I am Qianru Liao, and I also go by Lyra. I am a Ph.D. candidate in the Marine Estuarine and Environmental Sciences Graduate Program and the Department of Biology at the University of Maryland, College Park, where I work with Dr. William F. Fagan. I am a spatial ecologist trained at the interface of geography and biology, and my research integrates movement ecology, remote sensing, and quantitative spatial modeling to understand how environmental change shapes animal movement, connectivity, and ecological dynamics across landscapes.

My work asks how animals perceive, evaluate, and respond to dynamic landscape features, including melting lake ice, seasonal barriers, and shifting landscape permeability. Using Arctic barren-ground caribou as a model system, I examine how fine-scale movement decisions scale up to migration structure and functional connectivity under global change.

My dissertation research, conducted through the Fate of the Caribou Project, includes work on lake-ice crossing behavior during migration and the structure and reuse of summer movement routes under population decline. More broadly, I aim to develop transferable analytical frameworks that link environmental dynamics to animal decision-making and conservation-relevant connectivity.

Education

2021-2026 Ph.D. in Biological Science, University of Maryland, College Park, USA

2018-2020 M.S. in Geography, University at Buffalo, SUNY, USA

2016-2017 Undergraduate Exchange Program in Geography, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong

2013-2017 B.S. in Natural Geography and Resource Environment, Yunnan University, China

Experience

University of Maryland, College Park

Graduate Research Assistant, Department of Biology / MEES, 2021–2026

Conducted doctoral research on caribou movement ecology, dynamic landscapes, lake ice phenology, and reused migration routes.

Teaching Assistant, 2022–2026

[View course list and teaching details]

Served as a teaching assistant across 7 instructional appointments in the College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences, spanning introductory biology laboratories, upper-level ecology discussions, and graduate-level quantitative training. Across courses, my goal has been to create a learning environment where students feel supported, capable, and empowered to ask questions.

My teaching experience includes high-intensity biology lab sections of up to 48 students and graduate-level quantitative training for 50–70 Ph.D. In total, I have supported more than 350 students across seven semesters.

Undergraduate Research Mentor, 2022–2025

Mentored undergraduate research assistants on movement ecology, spatial analysis, and animal tracking projects.

Fate of the Caribou Project

Graduate Student Researcher, 2023–present

Studying how dynamic landscape features shape caribou movement, water-crossing behavior, and reused migration routes in the Arctic.

The Wildlife Society, 2026 Annual Conference, Des Moines, Iowa

Symposium Co-organizer, 2026

Co-organizer of “From Arctic to Himalaya to Antarctica: Wildlife and Climate Change Across the Three Poles,” Des Moines, Iowa.

View Poster 🔗

Peking University

Instructor, Wildlife Tracking & Movement Ecology Workshop, July 2024

Led a workshop on animal movement analysis, wildlife tracking, and reproducible coding workflows.