So how did

Burnett become batman? Originally interested in the acoustic calls of

cardinals, Burnett stumbled upon his interest in bats quite by surprise.

"One day while out taking some pictures [of birds], I heard a strange

sound, sort of like 'thip-thip-thip.' I looked up and saw a bird that

was flying very strangely. When the 'bird' landed on the trunk of a tree,

it was pretty obvious that what I was really seeing was a bat."

Beginning his

study of bats while in graduate school, Burnett earned a B.A. in biology

from Carleton College (1992), a M.S. in zoology from Ohio State University

(1997), and a Ph.D in evolution, ecology, and organismal biology from

Ohio State University (2001). He began teaching biology at Clayton State

in 2001 and has taught seven courses and five corresponding lab classes

as of fall 2002. In addition to teaching, Burnett is the faculty advisor

for Clayton State's biology majors and is a member of many societies involving

bats and biology.

To learn more

about Burnett and his past and present studies on bats visit Burnett's

homepage at https://a-s.clayton.edu/burnett. There you'll find Burnett's

first picture of a bat, an explanation of how bats use echolocation, sonograms

of bat calls, and much more.