About us

There have been dozens of people involved in this project and each has played important roles.  Below are brief bios of three of the main contributors.

Jason L. Brown. I am currently an assistant professor and researcher at Southern Illinois University. My research group is broadly interested in the factors that create and maintain the endless forms of biodiversity on earth. In my free time, I enjoy genealogies, woodworking, folk music, and fossil hunting. I’ve also been a longtime fan of strategy board games. My current top 5 board games are: Lewis & Clark, Five Tribes, Concordia, Suburbia, and San Juan


Morgan Muell. I’m an evolutionary biologist studying poison frog color pattern evolution. I’m also an Iowa native, casual reptile enthusiast, and musician in my spare time. My favorite board games are Biosphere and Pandemic, but like many people, I’m always down for a cutthroat round of Settlers of Catan.


Wilson Guillory. I am a Master’s student studying the evolutionary biology of poison dart frogs. I’m interested in anything related to biodiversity and have always been interested in ways to explore it using board and video games. My favorite game growing up was Spore, in which the player designs a creature and guides it as it “evolves” from a unicellular organism to a space-faring empire. The game’s biology was, in retrospect, deeply flawed, but it had a hand in keeping me fascinated with evolution as I got older. Today, I am interested in how board games can turn evolutionary principles into fun game mechanics and create engaging experiences that can be played in only a few hours. I also love territory-based “map” games that explore fantastic or historical settings. My current favorite games are Concordia, Settlers of Catan, and Evolution: Climate.


Other contributors: Allison Kellerman, Andrew O. Rubio, Ayana Scott-Elliston, Omar Morales, Katie Eckhoff, David Barfknecht, Jeremy A. Hartsock, Jennifer J. Weber, Jason Dallas, Carmen Burkett, Benton Hendrickson

Illustrations by Wilson Guillory