John was invited by Elizabeth to join our trip; he is one of the top beetle experts in the world and will be invaluable in identifying the tremendous diversity of beetles we'll collect. John has always been interested in visiting Chile-- this is his first trip, and perhaps his last major overseas expedition. He'll be looking for all kinds of unusual beetles for the U.S.-based "Beetle Tree of Life" project, but is personally interested in darkling beetles (Tenebrionidae), and lots of obscure families and weird things. One of John's main research interests is the relationships between the major lineages of Coleoptera.