Passion for endangered species propels Auburn DVM student to Smithsonian externship
By Troy Johnson
When Eli Morrow hung up his helmet, cleats and shoulder pads after playing football at the University of Utah, he had initially expected his educational and professional journey to continue with medical school. Instead, his attention shifted to cheetahs, red pandas, rhinos, black-footed ferrets, and other exotic and endangered species.
“Growing up as a kid, I used to say I wanted to have my own zoo,” said Morrow, a third-year Auburn University DVM student who is concurrently pursuing a Ph.D. in biomedical sciences. “I was always infatuated with animals. My birthday parties, when I was 3 or 4, centered around animals. I guess my parents probably should have known that I was meant to be a veterinarian.”
The suitability of Morrow’s choice earned an additional layer of validation from a credible source. The Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute (SCBI) offered Morrow an eight-week externship for the summer of 2026. Located in Front Royal, Va., the institute leads the Smithsonian’s global efforts to save wildlife species from extinction and to train future conservationists. The SCBI guides research programs at its headquarters, as well as at Smithsonian’s National Zoo in Washington, D.C., field research stations, and training sites globally.
Morrow said the externship offers an ideal opportunity given his interests in exotic species reproduction and endangered species repopulation. The SCBI leads efforts in reproductive genomics, artificial insemination and embryo transfer, which meets a critical need for species with low genetic diversity like cheetahs.
“They breed red pandas, cheetahs, maned wolves, scimitar-horned oryx, and several bird species,” Morrow explained. “I’m very excited because I’m especially interested in endangered species. Reproduction and reintroduction are crucial to my line of thinking in terms of what I want to do.
“I’ll be working with their conservation medicine unit and dealing with whatever may come up with all the animals they have in their collection and completing a research project.”
Hands-on experience builds confidence
Morrow will enter the externship with a wealth of lab and field experience. Through his work with Dr. Christine Charvet, assistant professor of neurosciences in the College of Veterinary Medicine, Morrow has gathered data from zoos nationwide to supplement “Translating Time,” a web-based tool that estimates equivalent stages of brain development across a variety of mammalian species. That experience opened the door for Morrow to work last summer with the Montgomery Zoo, the Chattanooga Zoo and the Teaching Zoo at Moorpark College in California to get insight into the zoo vet profession. Before graduation, he plans to complete an 8-week preceptorship at Fossil Rim Wildlife Center in Glen Rose, Texas, in spring 2027.
His summer also included a two-and-a-half week trip to wildlife sanctuaries in Thailand, where he took on some new veterinary challenges.
“It was an elephant medicine course,” Morrow said. “We had classes in the morning that would cover hematology, parasites, simple treatments and common problems. In the afternoon, we would go to the sanctuaries and provide veterinary care for those animals. We might have to give a rabies shot to an elephant. I got to actually draw blood from a younger male. Having a 6,000- to 8,000-pound animal sitting there looking you over can be pretty intimidating, but it was a fun experience.”
From football to Vet Med
Morrow’s undergraduate experience should have offered a few hints as to what awaited him academically and professionally. He studied biology and chemistry with the goal of becoming a trauma surgeon, but his free time away from studies and football frequently led him to the mountains near Salt Lake City and encounters with elk, wolves, and bears. Those interactions ignited his interest in pursuing a DVM.
A native of Huntsville, Ala., and the product of an Auburn family, Morrow headed to the University of Utah to carve a different path. He joined the football team as a defensive end before eventually moving to fullback. The life of a student-athlete – 4:30 a.m. wake-up calls to lift weights, four hours of afternoon practice and the balance of playbooks and textbooks – prepared Morrow well for the workload of simultaneously pursuing a DVM and Ph.D.
“I don’t have to wake up at 4:30 in the morning anymore,” Morrow said. “But that certainly helped set me up to be able to accomplish what I want to do and to be able to have the energy and drive to get things done.”