UW’s Collins Receives Posthumous National Award for Aquatic Science Excellence

University of Wyoming faculty member Sarah Collins, who passed away in October following a courageous battle with cancer, has been honored posthumously by the Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO).

Collins is the recipient of the 2026 Victoria J. Bertics Memorial Award, in recognition of her extraordinary contributions to aquatic science, teaching, mentorship and service to the scientific community. The award was accepted by her husband, UW Assistant Professor William Fetzer, during the joint meeting of ASLO and the International Society of Limnology in Montreal earlier this month.

The Victoria J. Bertics Memorial Award recognizes members whose careers and scientific potential were cut short by early death or disability. Collins was honored for her creativity, passion and dedication to the fields of aquatic ecosystem ecology and freshwater science, as well as her unwavering commitment to students, colleagues and mentees.

Collins, who joined the UW faculty in 2018 as an assistant professor in the Department of Zoology and Physiology within the College of Agriculture, Life Sciences and Natural Resources, was serving as director of the UW Research Institute at AMK Ranch in Grand Teton National Park -- a joint field station between UW and the National Park Service -- at the time of her death.

“As the director of the UW Institute at the AMK Ranch in the Grand Teton National Park, Dr. Collins was a phenomenal leader with an exciting vision for fully realizing the potential for this uniquely located field station,” says Parag Chitnis, UW’s vice president for research and economic development. “Her own research was conducted at Jackson Lake. By conducting Wyoming-relevant and internationally known research, she contributed to increase the profile of the university.”

A highly respected scholar in aquatic ecosystem ecology, Collins focused her research on elemental cycling and freshwater food webs. She was successful in obtaining numerous grants to fund her research and mentored dozens of graduate students and postdoctoral researchers in her lab, generously sharing her knowledge and passion with the aquatic science community.

Colleagues and students alike admired her intellectual curiosity, collaborative spirit, compassion and dedication to mentoring the next generation of scientists. Outside of her academic work, she enjoyed hiking, camping, skiing and spending time with friends and family.

“This award highlights the incredible loss felt by Sarah’s scientific collaborators and colleagues, and the impact of her research on local and regional water quality issues and the national and international scientific community,” says Fetzer, who is now the director at AMK Ranch. “Sarah served as a role model to her peers, demonstrating excellence in scientific achievement while prioritizing the well-being of others and life outside of work. Others and I are working to honor Sarah’s legacy by continuing her research efforts on Jackson Lake and starting a scholarship in her name to support freshwater research in Wyoming.”

Collins earned her bachelor’s degree in biochemistry and molecular biology from Lewis and Clark College before completing her Ph.D. in ecology and evolutionary biology at Cornell University. While at Cornell, she studied food web dynamics and biogeochemical cycling in temperate and tropical streams. During her Ph.D. studies, she was part of an interdisciplinary project that used Trinidad guppies to study ecological and evolutionary processes.

After graduate school, Collins was awarded a prestigious National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship for her high-impact research and went on to work on large-scale limnological datasets with Professor Patricia Soranno at Michigan State University and Professor Emily Stanley at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Center for Limnology.

In addition to her husband, Collins is survived by their children.

To donate to the Sarah Collins Memorial Fund, go here. For more information about the Victoria J. Bertics Memorial Award and the 2026 Aquatic Sciences Meeting, visit the ASLO official website.

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