Drs Monica Papes in Zoology and Tom Royer in Entomology received a $114,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to study a new exotic insect pest on cabbage and other crop plants. The insect is called the Bagrada bug and was first recorded in 2008 in southern California. Little is known about this insect's potential distribution or spread in United States. Lack of such information makes control of the pest very difficult. Papes and Royer will employ Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and ecological modeling to produce a first and time-critical assessment of the distribution potential of the Bagrada bug in United States. They will also investigate risk of infestation by overlaying the predicted distribution with a crop map for United States to locate risk of infestation of crop plants. This information will be used regionally, in the Great Plains, to raise awareness about this emerging pest by organizing a workshop with county extension staff and by creating documentation that will be available on Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service website.