Karl Palmquist

Karl is a native New Yorker, growing up on the south shore of Long Island, only leaving the state for a brief stint while attending Swarthmore College for his undergraduate studies. He has also been attracted to the beauty of nature—inspired by the shapes formed by animals and plants, opting for a microscope to capture such curiosities.

Karl is fascinated by the complexities of the world around us—from how cells talk in our bodies, to how people or insects interact in a society. By studying complex systems, he hopes to identify key components and then study their behaviors in the laboratory. Although Karl is traditionally a systems developmental biologist, he is developing skills at the intersection of developmental biology, complexity, and ecosystems science to move towards more interdisciplinary areas of study.

In addition to his academic work, Karl is a volunteer leader with the Sierra Club, and an Emerging Public Policy Leadership Awardee with the American Institute of Biological Sciences. He has worked on legislation and policy, locally and nationally, on wide-ranging topics from soil health to plastic pollution to vehicle emissions. The unifying theme: science and evidence-based decision making!