MISSISSIPPI STATE – Mississippi State University entomologist Richard Brown and two co-authors will be given the Editor’s Choice Award for writing one of the best entomological articles of 2008.

Brown and his colleagues will receive the award in December from the Entomological Society of America. The article, “Tracing an Invasion: Phylogeography of Cactoblastis cactorum in the United States Based on Mitochondrial DNA,” was published in the Annals of the Entomological Society of America.

“Among papers published in Annals during 2008 … this paper had the best combination of sound science, breadth of interest and good writing,” said Larry E. Hurd, the journal’s editor-in-chief. “The study was a nice combination of experimentation and molecular genetics brought to bear on a question of both theoretical and applied interest: How did an economically important, exotic insect get established in the United States?

“This paper stands as a fine example of the synthetic, integrative approach to science we like to publish in Annals,” Hurd said.

Brown’s research on the cactus moth was supported by a grant to the MSU Geosystems Research Institute from the U.S. Geological Survey. Brown cooperated on the article with Thomas J. Simonsen and Felix A. H. Sperling of the University of Alberta.

The Entomological Society of America is giving an award to the best paper in each of its four journals and the American Entomologist. The editors of the publications choose the winners, and winning articles receive a prize of $1,000.