[1] Her doctoral research centered on studying the population ecology of Isthmohyla calypsa—a tree frog found only in the Talamancan mountains—in the Reserva Protectora Las Tablas in Costa Rica.

She moved her field research site to Fortuna, Costa Rica where she and her colleagues, including Rick Speare, found dead and dying frogs.

[7][8] Amphibians drink and breathe by absorbing water and oxygen through their skin, but chytrids grow all over their bodies and interfere with their blood chemistry, leading to organ failure and eventual death.

[9] In the wake of the outbreak, Lips and her colleagues in ecology and environmental conservation began evaluating the threat of such epidemics on biodiversity and discussing policy interventions.

[10] Starting in 2008, Lips became a Professor at University of Maryland, College Park, where she currently serves as the Director of the Graduate Program in Sustainable Development and Conservation Biology.

[11] Her research group and collaborators have also observed and documented the spread of chytrids to salamander populations, which are infected by a species related to Bd known as Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans, or Bsal.

[12] The exotic pet trade has been implicated in the spread of Bsal, and Lips and her colleagues successfully advocated for banning salamander import into the United States.

[18] The advocacy efforts of her and her colleagues led the United States Fish and Wildlife Service to ban the import of 201 salamander species under the authority of the Lacey Act, which went into effect January 2016.