Barnes oversees more than 50 faculty and Institute research programs ranging from ecology
and ecosystems to molecular biology and genetics and research infrastructure that
include field stations, small- and large-animal facilities, core laboratories for
geographic information systems (GIS), genomics and proteomics. Major Institute programs
include the Center for Alaska Native Health Research, Alaska Basic Neuroscience Program,
Human Dimensions of Arctic Systems, and the Center for Molecular Genetic Studies of
Hibernation. Barnes' own research, sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF)
and National Institutes of Health, focuses on the physiological ecology and endocrinology
of hibernating mammals, biological rhythms and sleep, and overwintering biology of
animals including insects and the behavioral mechanisms by which animals cope with
high-latitude winter and summer environments. Barnes is a professor of zoophysiology
in the UAF Department of Biology and Wildlife; the Science Director of IAB's Toolik
Field Station and is the Research Focus Leader of the NSF EPSCoR program in Integrative
Approaches to Environmental Physiology. Barnes earned a Ph.D. in zoology from the
University of Washington in 1983 and was a post-doctoral fellow at the University
of California, Berkeley.
